Fly On
by findingmymuse
Summary: Max didn't know what to do...so she panicked. Read to find out what happens next! Better than my crummy summary, promise
1. Goodbyes

**Disclaimer: I am not the wonderful James Patterson, though I wish I was. Enjoy my story anyways :) **

**sidenote: Three years after MAX**

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Prologue

My name is Maximum Ride, or Mary Alice Martinez as my mother was planning on naming me, and this is the story that I feel I need to tell. Pay attention because I'm only going to say this once. What I did was far from excusable, but I need to get it off my chest in case I ever die (which could happen any time soon what with expiration dates popping up all over the place lately. RIP Gazman).

It starts with the creation of my daughter and goes from there. Most people don't know that I had a kid and I guess that's best since I'm still out there trying to save the world from all the wackos that created us. Not that that's the reason why I did what I did, I'm not making excuses for myself, but I want to tell this story truthfully.

Her conception was nothing special, though bless his heart, Fang tried to be romantic. We had been dating for two years and were about to get legally married (despite my objection to the whole having to be official on paper for it to matter thing that Mom was worried about). She was human so she didn't understand. But Fang got down on one knee to ask just for her so I knew that he was the real deal. We were in young love at sixteen but age didn't matter to kids brought up in lab cages.

Our "first time" wasn't on our wedding night because things changed quickly after we got engaged. No, we made love on the top floor of an abandoned building when we were taking shelter from the rain and out looking for a home to rent for the Flock. It was a week before the day he popped the question so maybe that's why he asked in the first place, but that part doesn't really matter now I guess.

I hate to admit this, but it took me six months to realize I was pregnant.

Don't judge me when I say that because I'm not normal. Being an Avian had its perks when it came to the "time of the month" as other girls called it. For Nudge, Angel, and I, periods were once every six months like clockwork. Every 19th of December and every 23rd of June all three of us would receive our gift from Mother Nature. Don't ask me why we all had the same cycle or any of that because quite frankly it is too embarrassing for me to talk about much longer.

Anyways, June 23rd came and went and I showed no signs of bleeding and whatnot. I wasn't too worried since Fang and I had only done "it" once (I told you things changed after we got engaged). We were experiments so we assumed that we couldn't reproduce with our genetic combinations. When my second cycle didn't come either,_ then_ I started to worry a little bit.

It was in the middle of one of the biggest fights for our lives when I realized I was actually pregnant. It was December 25th, Christmas day, and the rouge Flyboys and other reject experiments were there for some holiday revenge on me and the Flock.

I hadn't been feeling well all morning, but I didn't think anything of it. Though it was rare, birdkids did get sick. Ella didn't think it was nothing though, and she was the one to actually suggest that I might be with child. I ignored her because the idea didn't make any sense.

I was sixteen, on the run from the School, and barely on speaking terms with Fang anymore ever since the whole "he can't stop looking at other girls even though he claims he wasn't" fight a few months back. But when I felt that little nudge in my abdomen (and not from an outdated Eraser), I knew that I was really caring another life inside me.

I knew in that split second that my life as I knew it was over. Nothing else seemed to be in my mind at that one moment. It didn't matter that the Flyboys outnumbered us a hundred to six or that Angel had just taken a beating to the head and Iggy was running out of bombs. I was having a baby in three months.

This is where I start doing stuff that I'm ashamed of. I took off that night after making sure that everyone was sleeping. I was a coward and only left a note as an explanation. I knew that Fang would be mad, but it was something I felt I had to do. To this day, I doubt he knows he's a father. I hinted at it in my note, but I didn't have the heart to tell him what was really going on and that was cowardice too.

_Dear Flock, _

_I'm sorry, but I have to leave. Stay with my mom as long as you can, but leave when it's dangerous for either party. I love you guys and Fang, I forgive you for everything. This is something I have to do in order to ensure the safety of someone I really love. I'll return when I can, but don't wait up for me. Everything is different now. _

_Fly On, Max_

I waited out the three months alone and in a medium height cave. Well, alone isn't the right word since technically I had a visitor.

When I was too big to fly anymore, I called Ella. She was a vet in training and would keep this secret for me because I was her sister and she owed me. When she came with food every morning, I would make her swear again that she wasn't going to tell. She swore on mom's life so I knew that she hadn't in fact told. She would try to tell me about what the Flock was up to, but I would always shush her. I didn't think I could handle it.

March 4th came all too soon and like that, I had a daughter. Ella helped me through it as best as she could, but most of it was all me. I wished so much for Fang to be there but I knew that it was better this way. He wasn't ready to be a father and I was no where near ready to be a mother. It was too dangerous for her to stay with us. The School was still after us and I wasn't about to put another innocent life in Thier hands.

My little girl was perfect; ten toes and fingers, and no visible wings (though I knew she had them). She was special. She could hide her wings completely in ways that the Flock couldn't so I knew she would have a better chance of being normal than any of us could ever dream.

Ella thought she looked like me, but she was stretching it. No, this little girl was all Fang. She had his olive skin tone, little mats of his dark black hair, and his nose. What she got from me was my brown eyes and my smile (though she frowned or was crying most of the time so it was hard to tell). Her little wings were something beautiful too. They were almost completely black with a purple tint like Fang's but the tips were my tan color.

I stayed with the baby, nursing her for two months before I decided that I was getting too attached. She needed a normal life and that was something I couldn't offer her. I was sixteen and stupid enough to think that I could raise her for as long as I did.

Ella helped me pick out the church to leave her at. It was a Catholic church on the Nevada border and we scoped it out for a month before either of us decided it was good enough.

I left a note for whoever found her in hopes that she would be better taken care of.

_To Whoever Finds My Daughter,_

_Alexis is special. She's not a freak, or a sideshow, so treat her like it and there will be Hell to pay. She has wings, but you'll probably find that out on your own. She is truly unique and know that one day she'll be big enough to fly away and leave; let her. She's probably going to be a free spirit like me so don't get worried if she has an attitude or a good left hook. Love her like your own, because I can't. I'm too young to raise her so I'm putting my trust in you. It is not often that I do, so you'd better treat her right. I have a world to save, so I'm leaving my little girl in your care now so I can save it. _

_Fly On, Maximum Ride (yes, _the _Maximum Ride)_

I also left a note in the empty locket I got from Fang on our first date but that was for Alexis. I had to take out the picture of the two of us together and the one of the Flock smiling down for my mom, but I wanted Alexis to have as normal of a life as she could.

That's what I named her, by the way. Alexis.

Fang actually came up with the name when we were registering at school, normal school, when we first went to live with my mom. He thought I'd make a pretty Alex, but I fought him and decided to be just Max. I guess even in running away from him, he was still in every thought I had.

That hasn't changed over the past year, by the way. At seventeen, I made the hardest decision in my life when I left Alexis bundled up in blankets in a basket on the church steps.

After a week of watching Alexis at the church with the happy nuns, I went back home. I knew that they would care for her because though they all noticed her beautiful little wings when she slept, none made any move to gawk at them or snap pictures.

Ella was happy to see me again and so were the Flock. Except Fang. He was no where to be found. Nudge said he took off in search of me right after I left and hadn't been back since. Angel says she doesn't think that he had any plans of returning, but the others are more hopeful. I'm not sure what to believe anymore and as more days pass, I have even less faith that he'll return to me.

I hope that one day he'll come back and I can tell him about Alexis. Who knows, maybe by that time I'll have found the cure to experation dates and it won't all have been for nothing. Gazzy died in the middle of the night, his date kicked in a few weeks ago, and I don't know how our Flock can survive without another member.

My expiration date had been turned off, as well as Fang's, but I'm going to have to make another deal with the devil himself to keep Iggy, Nudge, and Angel's from popping up. Gazzy's came first despite his age due to the fact that he was a "failure" in the scientists' eyes. That fact made things even harder to bury him.

Now our little Flock is down to four since Fang has gone AWOL and Gazzy is dead. Iggy acts like he's tough enough to protect all of us "women" but he's more of a softie than I am, especially without his two best friends.

It makes me wish I hadn't given up Alexis. I cried for the first time since I was three and had my hand almost completely eaten off by an Eraser the night that I returned home without Alexis and Fang. My life felt empty. As if I was missing something I didn't know that I wanted.

I swore that night that I would reunite my family, biological or not. I wasn't going to let anyone else I loved slip from my grasp.


	2. Not A Bad Girl

**AN: This story will be told in Alexis's perspective so buckle up and enjoy the ride of Max's free spirited, trouble-making sixteen year old. Review and I might just let her meet her real family :)**

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Chapter One: Not A Bad Girl

"You have about ten seconds to hand over your money before you force us to take it from you." I said threateningly to the guy behind the counter.

My face was covered with my black ski mask, but I could still see out of it, and right now, my brown eyes were staring at the thirty year old behind the cash register who stood unmoved.

"Did I stutter?" I asked angrily, slamming my hand down impatiently. Luckily I was wearing gloves as well or else the courts would look me up in the System and I'd be sent back to juvie. I don't think I could do that to my f&p's again. Especially since Rockie got busted last time too.

Let me explain before you get confused. 'F&p' is the term Rockie and I came up for our foster parents. It sounds sort of like an insult or a new cuss word, but really it's their names. Fran and Patrick. I know, right? Could they be any dorkier?

They're nice people though and really seem to be wanting to keep me around so I try not to get into any trouble. They even are filling for my adoption so I can be another one of their Brady Bunch kids...but more on that later.

Anyways, I've been stationed here for a year, nine whole months longer than I've ever stayed anywhere. I'm what people in the System like to call a 'drifter.' I go where I want to and don't stay with a family for longer than necessary. I'm basically just biding my time until I turn eighteen in two years and can legally go out into the real world.

I guess I could just do that now; run away one night and never look back. But I have a Crew to protect, so I'm stuck here in the 'wonderful' city of LA with the Spearmen's.

Let me introduce the Crew while I have a spare moment. The guy at the register is still stammering to find the key to the drawer and from the look of his meaty hands, this might take awhile.

My name is Alexis Shadows. My birth parents picked Alexis, though at this point I could care less about what they wanted. They abandoned me after all. I was the one who chose my last name though so I feel like I earned it a little more. It was all thanks to one of the nuns who found me. Shannon Shadows. Since she was my practical mom until she died and I was sent into the foster care system, I pretty much owed it to her.

I'm the leader of the Crew, as was to be expected since I united all of us. I'm the feisty speed demon who takes nothing from no one and has a natural right hook and killer instants. I'm not bragging or making things up to sound good; I'm seriously that dangerous.

Unknown to anyone but Rockie, who doubles as my best friend, I'm also part bird. Not sure how much and quite frankly, I don't care, but I do know it was enough for my real parents to give me up. All they left was a crummy note and a stupid, taunting necklace that I wear at all times even though Rockie says it would be better for me to trash it.

Rockie, or Raquel as she was known to 'f&p', was our brute fighter. She ended up at the Spearmen's because her stepfather beat her for most of her life until she finally snapped and ended up hospitalizing him, thus causing her mother to abandon her at the age of thirteen. She's fifteen now so the wound was still fresh. She bounced around twice, before the Spearmen's took her in and adopted her.

Sixteen year old Susie was our third member. She went by anything resembling a tantilizing treat since that was her part in our missions when we went _really _off book. She was beautiful and knew how to charm her way past guards or even calm down a riot of grown men about to attack the Crew. Not much of a fighter though, so we usually didn't bring her on things like this. She was here today though, sitting in the car patiently.

Our fourth and last member of our all girl gang was a fourteen year old known only as "Ghost." She was from another foster family down the street, but we were drawn to her like a moth to a flame. The second I saw her, I knew she was going to be important to us.

She's a decent fighter, though not as strong as Rockie or me, but her real strength came in her speed. There was a reason she was called the Ghost after all. She was fast, but more importantly, she was a genious when it came to computers. We should have called her the Hacker because she could wipe a hard drive and leave not a single trace of her activity.

"Lex," Rockie said to me hastily, "take him out."

Though I was an amazing fighter due to the extra abilities I had because I had freaking wings, Rockie was still almost as good of a fighter as I was. She was all brute force though and very little technique like I was, so I usually took out guys behind the register whenever we robbed a place.

Now, don't look at me like that. I know that stare. I've seen it one too many times from social workers and foster parents over the years.

I wasn't a bad kid, none of us were, we just needed extra cash every now and then and we were certainly good at getting our hands on it. Besides, this was for a good cause for once. Annabelle was sick.

She's our youngest foster sib, making our total five (not including the Spearmen's actual son, Taylor).

She's six years old and dying of a simple cold. Her immune system has been shutting down for months, but no over the counter medicine has helped. She was rushed to the emergency room for the third time last night and the doc bill was way above the Spearmen's price range. So, to keep her healthy, they had to leave her at the hospital on a breathing machine while Patrick was out pulling a double shift tonight and Fran was by Annabelle's side.

The Crew figured this was our only option.

Back to the present, Ghost was standing by the door on lookout and Sugar was waiting in the car since other than me she was the only one with a driver's licesnse. Rockie was staring at me, urging me on, as I stepped forward and tied up the man who refused to hand over the much needed cash. I emptied the drawer just as Susie honked the horn signalling another customer about to come in.

"It's been a pleasure." Rockie said, lifting her mask just high enough so the man could see her grin before we fled the scene.


	3. Brain

Chapter Two: Brain

"Do you ever think about your real parents?" Rockie asked me, right after our hiest was completed and we were safe in our room.

"It's all I can think about." I answered back quietly, adjusting my feather pillow under my head.

"How can I not...with how_ special_ I am?" I asked rhetorically, though I knew she would know what I meant. Rockie was the only one that I trusted enough to tell about my wings and other special abilities; not even Fran and Patrick knew, but that was because I can physically hide my wings whenever I choose too.

"You think that's why you were left?" Rockie asked, playing through our usual conversation about parents like we always did whenever we did something dangerous that could possibly have landed us in prision or seven feet under. It was a comfort to go through the motions and talk out our past instead of what could have happened minutes ago.

"I don't know." I said, sighing. "Probably."

"Parents aren't all their cracked up to be." Rockie muttered for my benefit, though I knew talking about her mom was out of the question.

She dumped Rock here because she wouldn't listen to her daughter's pleas that her new husband was beating up the preteen until Rockie reacted back. I know that in Rockie's mind, her mom was as good as dead to her, just like her real father who actually was dead.

"I guess I'm glad I never got to meet mine." I said half-heartedly.

Rockie rolled over in her bed and I barely heard her mutter 'yeah, lucky' before she started lightly snoring.

That was another thing we had in common, other than being terrific fighters, we both snore; me louder than her, but both nonetheless.

I listened with my enhanced hearing for twenty minutes before I could tell that everyone in the house was now asleep. Then I crawled out of my window and on to the rickety roof just big enough for two to sit. I layed back, admiring the stars, until my mind began to wander.

I closed my eyes and tried to remember her face; my mother's, I mean. I was just a baby, but it was there taunting me in the back of my mind like a Christmas present I'm not allowed to open. She was beautiful, though nothing like me...which was probably why she was beautiful now that I thought about it, but so young. Oh, so very young.

_You know she couldn't keep you, so why are you thinking about it?_ That annoying pain in my head, that I like to call Brain, asked logically.

And no, Brain isn't my actual brain. He's a voice in my head that talks to me, usually when I don't want it there, but talks to me nonetheless. I'm not crazy; I really hear another voice in my head. And before you ask, I'm positive it isn't mine.

I think it's a male, but not because it sounds like it or anything, it just gives off this manly vibe despite its robot tone. He is like my protector in some ways, but he hardly ever gives me advice that I follow so most of the time I just wish he would leave me alone.

On top of always prying in my thoughts, he also comes with extra perks (like I wasn't enough of a freak with just the wings!) that make me even more unique.

I've been able to get these crazy images for as long as I could remember. It's always the same people. Three girls and three boys, ranging in ages depending on where I'm seeing them, but always together and always taunting me (or so it seems to me).

Sometimes the people in them would be flying like I do, sometimes they would be lying in trees, sometimes there would be less of them and they would be older, while other times they would be all together but so very very young.

I don't know who they are, but I've been seeing them, thanks to Brain, since I was old enough to ask questions about my family.

The only thing that I knew for sure was that the oldest girl had my piercing brown eyes and the guy who was usually at her side or watching her from a distance had the same shade of wings and the same dark hair as I did.

'Why is that, Brain?' I thought, hoping he would take the bait and answer my question straightforward for once.

_Always asking questions you aren't ready to hear, Alexis._ Brain said with a slight chuckle.

"My name is Lexi." I told the wind.

_You're just as stubborn as your mother._ Brain said, almost with a sigh.

'You know my mother!' I thought frantically. It was all I could think about since I was a little girl. Seeing her in my visions wasn't helping that much either. And now, come to find out, the voice that had been giving me pep talks for my entire life knew my mother this entire time!

_I did. _Brain replied. _For a short time, yes; I haven't seen her since you were born though so don't ask._

'Is she...is she okay?' I asked anyways, not able to control myself.

Like usual, I got no reply.

That night, I fell asleep on the roof, gazing at the stars and hoping that somewhere out there my real parents were doing the same thing and wishing that I was with them as much as I wanted to be with them.


	4. Thunderstorm

**AN: The more reviews I get, the sooner the Flock comes back into the story, fyi, so please review :) **

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Chapter Three: Thunderstorm

"Lex!" Someone called, shaking me frantically. "You have to wake up, now!" I heard Rockie say, shaking me once again. My brown eyes met her carmel ones and I woke up quickly at the sight of the panic in them.

I was such a deep sleeper that I didn't even notice that it was morning, or that it was raining down hard on the roof where I had previously been sleeping not even a few seconds ago. I didn't notice it was pouring down while I was sleeping, but now that I knew, it was irritating to feel sticky.

"Oh god, Lexi, I thought you died." Rockie said, leaning against the window sill and breathing deeply. She truly looked frantic and for the first time I realized just how much I meant to someone on this planet.

Now that she got over the shock of seeing me lying lifeless on the roof in the middle of a midnight storm, she started whisper-yelling at me. The others were still asleep, but Rockie had nightmares so she rarely slept through the night; hence why she was awake at three in the morning. "Don't do that again! What if Fran had caught you instead of me? She would have started asking questions again..."

I sighed, rolling my shoulders to relieve tension in my hidden wings. "I can handle her questions, Rock. I've done this before, remember?"

I was refering to the time a few months ago, right after I arrived in LA, that Fran had accidently walked in on me in the shower. I had forgotten to lock the door and she was collecting laundry like she usually did on Thursdays. I had had my wings out to enjoy the water while I cleaned in between my feathers.

She freaked out, having never been told that I was special, and asked a bunch of questions. I evaded most of them, telling her that she was crazy and that she had just seen my black towel over the handle. It worked well enough, especially when I showed her my bare back the next day when I decided to purposely wear a halter top.

My back is smooth to the touch once my wings have been properly hidden so I made sure to bump into Fran that day.

If you didn't already guess it, I can hide my wings. It's complicated, but simple for me as long as I'm not scared. Emotions affect how well all of my abilities work, though I don't know why.

Literally, I pull my wings close to my body and somehow they disappear into my back completely. They are a part of my spine or something, though I wouldn't really know since I was failing Anatomy.

It was painful for me as a baby when Miss Shadow (the nun who raised me until I could control my abilities and she finally had to let me go before people asked questions) helped me practice being normal.

"I know you can handle yourself." Rockie said, looking a little insulted that I would insinuate that she didn't think I could. "But I just wanted to wake you up just in case...besides," she said, opening the window a crack more so I could crawl through if I wanted to, "I didn't want you to drown anyways."

"Nah," I said, rolling my eyes at her comment. "I've got huge lungs, remember?"

Don't know how, but I have extra lungs, almost like bird air sacs or something. I'm not complaining though, because it lets me do a good number of things that wouldn't be possible for a normal human.

The main ones are swimming underwater for an insane amount of time, holding my breath whenever there is something gross around for almost an hour, and (the best one) being able to make-out without stopping for so long that it makes Taylor's head dizzy to participate with me.

Taylor Spearmen is my boyfriend, and also the only member of the family that actually belonged to Fran and Patrick biologically. He's sixteen, the same age as me, and is a total ginger. Short curly red hair, adorable freckles, and green eyes that make my heart stop. He's my soul mate, that much I know for sure.

_Birds mate for life, you know. _Brain piped up, though remained silent when I cursed at him in my mind.

Taylor and I have not "mated" mind you, (I don't want you getting the wrong idea-we're sixteen for crying out loud) but I know that he's going to be my husband or lover or whatever he wants to be when we're older so I guess my Brain was right.

I can't imagine a life without Taylor and though he couldn't possibly love me as much as I love him due to my Avian DNA that makes all of my emotions a hundred times stronger than a human's, he cares about me as much as a teenage boy can.

"How could I forget?" Rockie teased, refering to Taylor and my make-out sessions whenever we got the chance. She was a year younger than us, but she was mature so she didn't yell "cooties" like Mikey Jay or tattle to f&p like Kevin would.

"Hey, you gonna come in or not?" Rockie asked a minute later when niether of us had said anything and I was still sitting soaking wet on the roof.

I shook my head, letting the water rickashay off of my dark black hair. I smiled at her. "I'm gonna go for a fly." I said, not giving her a moment to reply or argue with me that the storm was dangerous.

I did my best thinking when the rain was my only ally. And right now, I had a lot to think about. Mainly, it was about my parents. Like always.

Why did they give me up? Where they special too? Did they give me my wings or was I a science experiment gone wrong? Was there a whole clan of my relative bird people somewhere? And the most important question: Were they the flying bird kids I saw in my visions?


	5. Chocolate Chip Cookies

**AN: Soooo sorry for accidently posting the wrong chapter to the wrong story. I've never done that before so it is more upsetting to me than to you, trust me. Here is the chapter you guys were supposed to get...**

**Also, I know I've mentioned it before, but I really want this story to take off so the more reviews I get, the sooner the Flock comes back into the story so review because it is killing me to keep holding back :) **

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Chapter Four: Chocolate Chip Cookies

When I returned from my three-in-the-morning flight, it was nearing dawn. The cool air didn't bother me, but the rising sun did, so I returned home earlier than I had originally planned. I still had a lot of thinking to do and being at the Spearmen's never really helped with that.

I entered the house from my bedroom widow next to the roof and slipped into the room as quietly as I could. I knew that Rockie sensed my presence, but she didn't make any sound to acknowledge me. Great. She was mad at me for just taking off on her earlier.

I knew she worried, but I was a freak. I didn't follow normal rules and I didn't like feeling trapped, whether physically or mentally, so I flew off a lot. She wasn't used to it yet, even after four months of knowing my secret, and I wasn't used to having anyone know so it was hard for us to have nights (or mornings, I guess now) like now.

I stared at her dark figure for a moment, waiting for her head to turn so I could see her caramel eyes but all I saw was the back of her frizzy black hair, before deciding to head to the kitchen. She would get over it, and when she did, I would be eating. Flying took a lot out of me.

Much to my surprise, there were already people in the kitchen when I got there.

Susie was sitting on the counter, her long legs dangling off the end. She was my age, but we didn't have anything in common other than the Crew and that she only halfway participated in. She was good at her role though; tall, tan, blue eyed, and blonde: she was the perfect image of a supermodel or, in our case, seductive bait.

At the table with her was Kevin. The eight year old's blonde-brown hair had been buzzed recently due to a lice break out at the middle school he went to, but he pulled it off. His hazel eyes met mine and he smiled at me when he spotted me in the kitchen.

"You wanna help us make cookies?" Kevin asked sweetly as he tried to crack an egg into the bowl that Susie was stirring halfheartedly with one hand. "Mom said Annabelle was lonely so we were going to bring her something to cheer her up. And Mikey Jay said she liked cookies, but I think he just wanted some...but we've already got all the ingredients out anyways."

"What do you think?" Kevin asked, urging me to try it. I dipped my pointer finger in the batter and placed it in my mouth hungrily. Cookies were my weakness (especially those of the chocolate chip variety), right next to Taylor's kisses, and I hadn't ever met a cookie I didn't like. That is until now.

"Sugar?" I asked, trying to hide my disgust at the awful taste.

"Yeah?" Susie responded to one of her many nicknames, but I laughed.

"No, I mean did you add any sugar?" I asked.

Kevin smiled sheepishly and shook his head. "I got the eggs though." He said happily.

I pretend 'tsk, tsk'ed and grabbed the bowl from him. I emptied the contents into the disposal and started from scratch. Cooking was a useful skill for anyone, but especially for me.

I was part bird so something in my DNA required a LOT of food and long flights or missions with the Crew didn't help with that either.

Fran taught me to cook when I first arrived as an attempt to bond. At least, that's what she says now; I think it was because I kept waking her up in the middle of the night with hunger pains and requests for full meals.

By the time the first batch of the cookies for Annabelle were done and cooling, everyone else was pretty much awake and hungry. I threw some extra eggs in a skillet, got out the bacon, and started looking for the frozen pancakes in the fridge.

I felt a hand on my back and for a moment I imagined myself grabbing the arm and flipping it in an instant until my prey was paralized. But only for a moment. That natural instinct faded once I inhaled slightly and recognized that it was only Taylor.

I spun around on my heels and kissed his lips briefly, not sure if Patrick had left for work yet and unsure if Fran had come down for breakfast yet. We were openly dating, there was no denying we were a couple, but Taylor always got lectures about being with me since I was soon to be his adopted sister. Not that I was probably going to stick around that long, but still; the f&p's didn't know that last part though.

"When's the food go-" Mikey Jay started to ask, until he saw us kissing. "Eww" was his immediate response and I had to bite my tounge from saying something sarcastic.

The twelve year old still believed in cooties, so our PDA was unsettling to witness with his dark black eyes. The fact that he grew up in an Asian culture until about three years ago when he moved here with his parents who soon both died in an accident wasn't helping it. They believe in not showing affection very often and a lot of other things that I didn't quite agree with.

I ruffled his black scruffy hair teasingly while Taylor got the rest of the breakfast food out for me. "You'll understand one day." I promised, but Mikey Jay only shook his head stubbornly.

When the food was almost done and everyone was busy setting the table, I snuck over and stole a warm cookie off of the cooling rack.

As I sunk my teeth into the delicious dessert, Brain decided it would be the perfect time to ambush me with a brain attack and mental images of the girl that I had decided long ago was my mother eating cookies like the one I held.

It gave me an ache in my head and an even deeper, more painful ache in my heart.


	6. New Girl

Chapter Five: New Girl

I was the last of the kids staying at the Spearmen's to leave for school. Though most of us went to the high school together, I prefered to fly there and meet up with them when they got there. It was my private time and I loved, cherrished, and promised to be faithful to it.

I tucked in my wings when I was close enough to the school to be seen, and continued on my journey on foot. I spotted Emily Rebeck and Hollis Wayne making out in front of the building like usual and went to break the couple up. It was my job as one of their best friends to annoy them like they did with Taylor and me.

"Hey guys." I said coming up right behind them, startling Emily so she bit down on his lip.

"Oww." Hollis complained, shaking his blonde hair out of his hazel eyes in protest.

"I'm sorry." Em appologized, her own green eyes staring at him instead of me, despite it being me who broke them apart.

"Have you seen Audrey?" The curly brunette asked when she finally stopped looking into her boyfriend's eyes.

Audrey Laney was our other best friend. She was the gossip of the group, Hollis was the boy, Emily was the diva, and I, well I brought the attitude to the mix.

Just as I turned my head in search of her, I spotter the top of her redish brown hair in the crowd coming towards us. Her hazel eyes glanced first at Hollis (who she had secretly had a crush on long before Emily claimed him), then me (as her best friend), and finally at Emily (who she butted heads with a lot).

"Oh my gosh, you'll never believe who just moved here." Audrey said with a rush of words, her hands flinging out and almost hitting me as she began to tell her story.

I spotted Taylor, Susie, and Rockie and signalled them over as well. Audrey usually had the best gossip and I figured my family of sorts would appreciate whatever she had to say.

Susie ignored my glance, gesturing with her eyes towards the cutie from science instead and went to join him. Rockie took her spot between Audrey and I while Taylor wrapped his arms around me from behind and rested his head on my shoulder so he could hear.

"Laney was just telling us about some new kid, Spearman." Hollis told Taylor, rolling his eyes and using only last names like a typical jock.

"So? Spit it out." Emily said at long last. There was only so much suspense that could be drawn from a long pause.

"Monique Graves' daughter!" Audrey said with excitement, bouncing on her toes in excitement.

"Who is Monique Graves again?" I asked, unable to resist teasing her. Rockie giggled besides me, Taylor chuckled, and even Hollis was biting back a smile.

She and I both knew that I knew that MG was not only a world renound fashion designer, but also Audrey's idol. Monique became a major fashion icon about fifteen years ago, at the young age of fourteen!, and had since been promoting her 'Save the World' line of t-shirts, as well as designer boots, hats, and anything else you could name. I happened to have a pair of MG sneakers, made for cross-country runners but were quite handy when I wanted to take off from the roof.

Sources revealed that Monique was currently living in Los Angeles with us, though probably on the richer part of town. The fact that her daughter was going to be going to school here now was incredible. Rushwood wasn't exactly known for its high class residents.

"Wow, a celebrity's kid?" Emily asked, thouroughly impressed. "It's about time this joint got a little class."

Her daughter, Krystal, was about twelve now according to tabloids. "She's got to be a freshman, right?" Rockie asked, doing the math in her head and hoping that it was true. She was the only one of us that was a sophmore, but most of them had combined freshman/sophmore classes throughout the day; the rest of us were juniors.

"Actually, she was supposed to be in the eighth grade, but she was so smart that she's practically graduating. She's only got one more credit left until she can be a senior." Audrey said, even more excitement in her voice now. The rest of us stared at her blankly. "Krystal is going to be a junior with us!"

With that happy note, we all went to class, trying to catch glimpses of the famous new girl; the whole school would be buzzing my second period but for now the halls were quiet on gossip about Krystal Graves.

I slid into my first period seat, the only class I didn't have with any of the Spearmans, and laid my head down. I felt a body scooting a chair next to me and half smiled. I got the new kid in my class; I could tell because I sat in the back and the only other empty seat was next to me.

Not to mention the fact that the person to my right smelt nothing like anyone I had ever met. He/She (though I figured it was Krystal so I'll say she) had a distinct smell: pinetrees and hearling wind.

I lifted my head up and half smiled at the mixed girl next to me.

She had blue eyes, pale carmel skin, frizzy blond hair on top and brown undertones; exactly what she looked like in the latest magazine issues. No one had gotten a picture of her mom since Krystal had been born and began promoting the clothes instead.

"Hi, I'm Alexis." I said when the girl didn't speak and kept staring at me.

"K-Krystal." The icon stuttered, her ice blue eyes still locked onto my brown ones.

"I know you're famous and all, so you're probably used to people staring at you, but I'm not so I'd appreciate it if you didn't stare. 'kay? Thanks." I said with as little sarcasm as I could muster. It was hard, but I had to remember that she wasn't like me so she didn't understand how her gaze made me feel like a freak.

"Sorry," She said, her cheeks flaming as pink as her semi-dark skin would let it, "its just, you look so familiar..." She said, shaking her head at her crazy thought before I could say that there was, in fact, no way that she could know me. Foster homes and the Ritz are sort of not exactly in the same neighborhood.

"Just don't stare again." I half threatened and her icy eyes widdened in surprise. Twinkle-toes had some getting used to if she was going to become my friend, which by the way she_ still _kept staring, she obviously wanted to.

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**AN: Bonus points for whoever figures out why Krystal is important :) **


	7. Heritage Day

Chapter Six: Heritage Day

It had been a week since Krystal Graves enrolled and I had yet to shake her from my side. Something about my charmingly sarcastic personality drew her to me like a moth to a flame, despite the fact that everyone on the planet wanted to be friends with the famous child model/designer's daughter.

I was really regretting saying anything to her that first day. I just wanted to fly around for hours this morning, but alas, I had to eventually come down and hide in the trees while I tucked in my wings. I wished more than anything to be free to soar and think on my own, but skipping was not an option today (at least not since Fran was going to be calling the school to make sure we were all there today).

You see, today was "Heritage Day" at Rushwood High and with all of the recent thoughts about my mom thanks to Brain, I was not looking forward to it.

Rockie, Susie, and I made a brilliant plan to skip today since the whole idea of "Heritage Day" was upsetting. But Mikey Jay somehow found out and blabbed to the f&p's who had insisted that we all had to go.

Since we either knew where we came from and didn't want to get drawn back into the tragic memories or, like me, didn't have a clue who my parents were let alone if I could trace back their roots, it was going to be a long and difficult day.

The only good thing was that today we wouldn't be having normal classes so we could roam around the cafeteria and gym to "better appreciate our cultures and those of the fellow students at Rushwood," or so the Principle said over the announcements. Which basically means we get to eat a meatball, decorate a flag if we chose, and listen to music that we usually wouldn't even consider normally.

The worst part was that we were getting graded on what we found out and I had no clue what I was so I didn't know where to start.

"Let's get this over with." Rockie whispered to me once the older members of the Crew met up in the hallway. All of our other friends were already immersed in their own cultures.

Audrey was at the European booth with Emily; both girls looked extremely bored but stuck around nonetheless. Hollis was at the Russian booth staring at his mom like she was crazy for wearing an outfit from the "old country" and Taylor was checking out the Irish pub mugs.

"Where should we start?" Susie asked, her blue eyes wide with nerves.

"Why don't you fill out this quiz?" Phillip Grad, the head of the student council and pretty much anything else that could have a leader, said, startling us. I hadn't heard him approach-and I had the best hearing out of anyone!

"Thanks, Phil." Sugar said, batting her eyelashes to get the nerd going. 'That was what she was good at after all', I thought with an inward smile.

"Um...no problem, S-Susie." Phillip said, handing over the packets and moving on to the next group of teens before he confessed his undying love fore Susie Spearman.

Twenty minutes later, Susie was either French or Canadian, Rockie was decided to be of African descent (though that was kind of obvious from looking at her mixed skin), and I was still nothing.

_Everyone is something, Alexis._ Brain thought to me smugly.

'Yeah, I don't suppose you'd like to tell me what exactly I am, would you?' I thought, knowing it was unlikely.

Much to my surprise, it answered. _Your father was Italian and your mother was half Hispanic, half Caucasian. _

My jaw dropped, though to anyone not it my head it seemed out of ordinary and I got a few strange looks. Right now, I didn't really care about any of that.

'You've been holding out on me!' I accused angrily. Brain knew my parents, probably knew what they looked like, and I had spent the last sixteen years of my life wondering about the very things like that.

_It was never important that you know. I'm only telling you now so you don't fail. _Brain said honestly.

"What else haven't you told me!" I said angrily, forgetting for a moment that I was talking to the voice in my head and now even more people were starting to stare at the crazy girl talking to herself. Just great. 'You said once that you knew my mother, is it you that's sending me my visions?'

Once something got in my mind, I had to find out the answer to it or else I'd go crazy. Today I wasn't backing down. I was going to learn more about my parents even if it killed me. Brain could screw it.

_The visions are a part of your power. _Brain explained, sounding slightly irritated that I would insinuate that it was responsible for them, or maybe it was for the 'screw it' part. Eh, I'm not here to make friends with the voice in my head.

God, how crazy did I sound? I should be locked up somewhere secure with padded walls and white hug-yourself jackets.

_That's highly unlikely. _Brain said, sounding a bit amused despite his obvious anger. _Besides, I wouldn't be doing my job if I let you get captured. _

'And what exactly is your job? To drive me insane? To loop around all of my questions? To remind me how much of a freak I am?' I thought angrily, storming into the hallway and away from the busyness of the Heritage Day Booths.

_You aren't a freak. That's why you're here, Alexis, to_ prove_ that one of your kind can blend into society like the rest of the human population. _

'I'm just an experiment?' I thought in disbelief. 'My parents put me in foster care to prove that I'm normal? Are you kidding me? There isn't a normal bone in my genetically enhanced body. I have wings and superspeed, can turn completely invisible when I'm scared, can hear and see farther than any chart can detect, have psycic visions, and a voice in my head! How in the world could I possibly be normal?'

Brain had no response to that and I felt it leave my mind slowly.


	8. The Invite

Chapter Seven: The Invite

Since my talk with Brain, things had been tense within my own mind so I was taking it out on all of my friends.

I was so confused, but most of all, I was angry at Brain for not telling me more about my parents. I wanted to know my mother more than anything in the world, yet Brain was being criptic and unhelpful. He was the freakin' voice in my head; didn't that count for something to him? Apparently not.

So when I saw Audrey coming down the hallway in my direction, I was a tad bit upset. Suddenly my locker combination was the furthest thing from my mind. I just wanted to go back to the Spearman's (it was NOT my home; until I got to meet my parents nothing would feel like home.)

"Oh my gosh!" Audrey said, rushing to me after the final bell rang and we were released from our classes. I was standing by my locker, trying desperately to remember the code but completely drawing a blank.

"What is it?" I asked, slightly irritated because my locker wouldn't open for the life of it. I gave it a gentle kick and was shocked when I could make out a dint in the pale blue painted metal.

Audrey didn't notice because whenever she had something to tell, usually gossip, she had extreme tunnel vision. "_Krystal Graves_," she said the girl's name as if she were a god instead of just a regular twelve year old who happened to have a very famous mother, "is having a _party_."

"That's the dirt?" I asked, shaking my head and putting in my locker combination again. 04-04-04. Still no luck.

Audrey, and Susie who just joined us, stared at me as if I had wings growing out of my back; which I did.

"A party thrown by the most famous girl to ever walk the halls of Rushwood? Are you kidding me?" Susie said, excitement in her blue eyes. "This is only _the _talk of the whole school."

"I heard that it's invite only." Audrey said with a half sigh, glancing around the corridor for KG herself in hopes of an invitation.

But Susie just shook her head. "No, Hollis has her third period when she announced it and he told Emily who told Rockie who told me. Apparently she said, 'come one, come all.'" She used her pointer and middle fingers on both of her hands to do air quotes.

"An A-list party? Full of everyone? That doesn't sound very high class." Audrey said, sounding half disapointed that it wasn't invite only. I didn't have the heart to tell her that this was probably the only way she would ever get invited to a party at Monique Grave's house so I bit my tongue.

Susie smiled at me, thinking the same thing, but continued anyways. "She really wants this to be a huge deal and said something about wanting to make sure_ everyone_ from Rushwood attended."

Audrey laughed, shaking her red-brown curls in the process. "Who would be insane enough to miss the party of a lifetime?"

I cleared my throat, hoping they wouldn't make a big deal out of it.

"Lexi! That's social suicide!" Audrey exclaimed dramatically. I simply huffed. I was never one to understand normal people's infatuation with being popular and social butterflies; that was probably just because I wasn't normal to begin with though.

"What's suicide?" Taylor asked as he approached my locker with Rockie at his heels. I grinned at my beautiful ginger, kissing his lips lightly, before rolling my eyes.

"Not going to some dumb party is apparently going to cause my imediate demise." I said with a half grin, rolling my eyes again.

"Dumb party?" Rockie asked in disbelief, looking at Audrey instead of me. "She doesn't mean _Krystal Graves' _party, does she?"

Audrey shook her head up and down, nodding vigerously in disbelief as well.

"I just don't see what the big deal is about her." I said with a sigh. "She's just a nomal girl like the rest of us."

'Except for my wings,' I thought wryly.

"Hey," Taylor said in fake hurt, "I'm a boy."

"As if I could foget." I said with a giggle. "I doubt a girl could kiss me like that."

"Ew, gross." Audrey said, rolling her eyes at our 'coupleyness.' "But seriously, you can not miss this party."

Rockie nodded in agreement and even Taylor seemed to be on their side. I just didn't see the point in trying to fit in.

"Lexi?" An unsure voice asked from behind our group and the girls' eyes were wide with shock and jealousy.

I turned around to find the voice and my eyes zeroed in on Krystal's small form. Her frizzy hair was straightened today and she had a small tiara atop her head, making her look like the princess everyone else thought she was.

"Yeah?" I asked my practical stalker from first period. She had some weird fetish with being around me all the time.

"I just wanted to personally invite you to my party." She said, her bright eyes glimmering with hope. "You are going, aren't you?" I couldn't take this 'Christmas' moment from her.

"Of course I'm going." I said, giving in to peer pressure like the rest of the population.

_Welcome to the real world. _Brain taunted and I mentally flipped him off.


	9. Party, Party, Party

Chapter Eight: Party, Party, Party

"I can not believe we're at _Monique Graves'_house." Rockie said for the thousandth time since we left the house. "I'm _seconds_ away from meeting the most famous fashion designer in the world."

Taylor pulled the Spearmen's minivan onto the front lawn. Everyone else seemed to have parked out front so we followed suit and pulled the gold van next to Hollis' beat up red Camero.

"She probably won't even be here." I said logically as I unbuckled. "Someone that famous probably has better things to do than to hang out with a bunch of high schoolers."

"Someone has to chaperone...right?" Rockie asked, sounding slightly put down at the prospect of not getting to meet her idol.

"I'm sure either Monique, or her husband, Geo will be here." Taylor said reassuringly.

"Who knows?" Susie said with a wink to Rockie and me. "Maybe the parents will be MIA and we'll have free reign of the house."

"Do you really think...?" Rockie asked, her caramel eyes lighting up and looking a few shades lighter.

"No." I answered for her, shooting a glare at Sugar for giving her the idea. There is no way that I would let my foster siblings go to an unsupervised party; especially not with how Susie acted with a few of the boys at school. I doubt Fran would have even let us get out the front door if that was true.

"Besides," I said, trying to lighten the mood, "we're here for Krystal, remember?"

"Not like we even know her..." Susie said, shooting me a brief jealous stare before applying more lip gloss and flipping her blonde hair over her shoulder as she got out of the van.

Though she tried to act like it didn't matter, I knew Honey was upset that I had classes with 'Krystal Graves' and she was stuck with losers. She was the people person, I was the loner; she was the cheerleader, I was the girl with wings that tried to blend in with the crowd.

"What's her deal?" Taylor asked from the driver's seat, his face suddenly close to mine and I forced back a smile.

"She'll be alright." I shrugged, grabbing my water bottle. I got dehydrated a lot due to my fast metabolism and with this being the first actual party I've ever been to, I didn't want to risk the punch being spiked. "Now, let's go have some fun."

Rockie had already run ahead and met up with Emily and Hollis who were touring the house, or so Audrey said when we spotted her on the couch. She always knew everything, even when she only arrived at a party minutes before us.

Geo was here, but Monique was at Fashion Week in Europe, hence why Krystal was allowed a party. The punch indeed had been spiked, but one of the bodyguards that the famous family had found the culprit out and took him down to the station while another punch bowl was brought out.

The doors to most of the rooms were locked so there was nothing special to do except dance in the three rooms designated for it or eat in the kitchen/dining room.

For being famous, the Graves had a semi-regular sized house. They had high ceilings, bullet-proof windows, black out curtains, and a massively elaborate kitchen. Other than that, it kind of reminded me of the Spearman's house.

Taylor and I ended up in one of the three dance rooms. This one was smaller than the rest and only fit about fifteen people or so. Taylor Swift's 'Mine' played in the background and I smiled at my Taylor. This was our song, as cliche as it was. For now we were all alone and I liked it that way.

Or so I thought.

"Oooh, goodie!" I heard an excited voice scream and suddenly felt two small hands wrapped around my arm. "I'm soooo glad you came!"

I turned around and saw that Krystal was behind me in the empty room.

"Hey, Krystal." I said with a chuckle and a grin towards Taylor. He thought it was strange that my biggest fan was the famous daughter of Rockie's idol.

"Well, I said I would come, didn't I?" I asked with a grin, slowly pulling Krystal's hands off of me. I wasn't huge on emotion, but I didn't want to hurt her feelings by rejecting her completely. I was four years older than her, and though I never had a little sister, I assumed that Krystal would be exactly the kind I wanted.

"Yes, yes, you did." Krystal rambled. "I was just thinking that you didn't really seem all that interested in coming and I didn't want to, like, force you or anything, but I seriously, like, really wanted you to come. I wanted you to meet my parents, but as it is, my mom's out of town so, like, that's a bummer, but you can still meet my dad. I want him to see my best friend 'cause I think he thinks I'm making you up."

"Sorry, I tend to get carried away with my stories sometimes," She said with a laugh, though still didn't take a breath, "and dad just laughs and says, 'your mother was the same way as a teen,' but I like that about myself. I mean, it's like one of my skills, talking I mean, and I, like, just love to talk but I'm always getting in trouble for it with everyone so I try to stay quiet but like I said, you're my best friend so I can tell you..."

"Krystal," I heard an older man chuckle and turned around to see an ice cream cone (blonde, pale, and tall as a string bean) standing behind the three of us, "leave the poor girl alone or she'll never come back."

Krystal giggled, nodding as her mocha skin blushed with embarrassment. "Yes, Daddy." She went to kiss his cheek before returning back to my side.

"Daddy, meet my best friend Lexi Shadows." She said, gesturing towards me. "Lexi, meet my father Geo Graves."

I nodded towards him in greeting, but Krystal's small voice whispered something I never expected. "Lex, my dad's blind."

Now I felt really dumb. From the look of him, you couldn't tell, but I stared briefly at his slightly cloudy blue eyes and knew it was true.

"Sorry, sir." I said, reaching out and trying to shake his hand. Miraculously, he met me halfway and shook my hand with a firm grip.

His sightless eyes met mind and he let out a gasp, holding my hand even tighter and rubbing circles along my palms. Now I was starting to get creeped out.

"Well, it was nice meeting you." I said, pulling my hand away and grabbing Taylor's instead. I pulled him halfway out of the room before I turned back, remembering Krystal. "I'm sure I'll see you around the party, Krys." I said, thinking the whole time that I just had to get out of there now. The guy was giving me major Heebie-Jeebies.

* * *

**AN: Pleeeeeeeaaase please tell me that someone has figured it out now. I'm being as un-subtle as I can be lol. So review! **


	10. Unforseen

**AN: This chapter will be in a Third Person's POV but don't worry, Lexi will be back next chapter :) As always, review...it's about to get good!**

* * *

Chapter Nine: Unforseen

"Krystal," An older man chuckled to his daughter, his tall frame shaking with laughter, "leave the poor girl alone or she'll never come back."

Krystal giggled innocently. "Yes, Daddy." She kissed her father's cheek and Geo listened to the sound of her tiny feet scurrying back to her friend.

"Daddy, meet my best friend Lexi Shadows. Lexi, meet my father Geo Graves." A few moments later, Geo heard his little girl whisper to her new friend, "Lex, my dad's blind."

"Sorry, sir." The girl said and shook his hand.

When they came into contact with each other, the man had flashbacks to another sixteen year old girl with similar features. Though he was blind, that didn't stop him from being able to recognize people; fingerprints especially were one of his many trademark tactics. That's how he was able to stay a private detective despite being legally blind since childhood.

And Geo Graves _knew_ this girl was familiar somehow. He gripped the girl's hand tighter and rubbed circles along the palm to double check his suspicions. His sightless blue eyes widdened when he made the connection and he let out a gasp.

"Well, it was nice meeting you." The girl's tough voice sounded scared, but just like her mother, she tried not to show it. "I'm sure I'll see you around the party, Krys."

"You scared my new best friend." Tiffany-Krystal Romona Graves complained to her father. "Why'd you have to, like, practically hold her hand? I doubt Momma would approve." She said with an irritated sigh.

Krystal didn't know what was going on in Geo's brain, because if she did, she wouldn't be upset that Lexi ran out of the room so fast. Heck, if Lexi knew what was running through Geo's mind, she'd be begging to talk to him.

If his assumptions were right, of course.

Instead of answering his daughter, he sent her back to her party which was now in full swing, and picked up his phone instead. He knew how to find his speed dials (and pretty much all of the other essential buttons on the phone) so he pressed number 1 and waited for the ring.

"Come on, pick up, pick up." He muttered under his breath, pacing the spare dance room with nerves as he hung up when he got the message for the second time.

On the third try, he left a criptic message for his wife, knowing that she would understand and call back right away. "The wings have touched down." It was a secret code from long ago, back when things hadn't changed yet and their family was bigger.

He hung up, pacing once more and cursing under his breath when he accidently ran into the empty DJ booth. When he was nervous he paced, and when he paced, he couldn't get his barrings and ran into things.

Two minutes later, his wife's frantic voice was at his ears when he pulled the tiny phone to his ear.

"Oh, god, Geo, what is it?" Monique Graves, fashionista to the world, said frantically. "Is Krys okay? Did you get spotted? What's wrong? Is it Max? Oh god, did you see Fang?"

Geo didn't know how to respond, or how to explain what he thought he had just found out, so he took a deep breath.

Just as he was about to speak, Monique cut him off angrily. "Answer me right now, Iggy, before I go insane!"

And like that, they were back sixteen years ago.

Back when they were just two birdkids on the run with four other teenagers. Back when they were a Flock and a family and completely together.

Back when Nudge wasn't famous and Iggy was just the blind guy that couldn't see who was in love with him right in front of him. Back when they were running for their lives and the world wasn't saved. Back when Max was in charge and Fang was the loyal sidekick.

Back before Max ran away, Fang left, Gazzy died, and the Flock split up.

Iggy sighed into the phone. "I don't know how to say this..."

And with that, he explained the best he could how he was almost positive that Lexi Shadows was somehow related to Maximum Ride, the fearless leader who hadn't been heard from by the two of them since Krystal was born twelve years ago, and that he knew who the father was too.

"You think he knew?" Nudge whispered, the sound of Fashion Week buzzing behind in the background. "I bet that's why he left..."

Iggy shook his head, forgetting for a moment that she couldn't see him since she was in Paris and he was in LA. "Fang wouldn't do that. Though why Lexi is here and Max never said anything about her is a little strange too, don't you think?"

"I don't know what to think." Nudge said with a sigh. "Does Krystal know that you're thinking this?"

"No, but I did sort of creep Lexi out so I doubt she'll be coming back around the house anytime soon." Iggy said, frowning at himself for being so stupid. He had finally found a piece of the Flock and he let her go.

"She'll be back." Nudge said, her voice portraying the smile he imagined in his mind. "I'll be back in a week and there's no way that Lexi and her friends will want to pass up the oppurtunity to meet a celebrity."

"You know I love you, right?" Iggy said with a smirk.

"You keep saying that." She said, and her laughter drowned out the party going on behind him.


	11. Ball in Motion

Chapter Ten: Ball in Motion

"You'll never guess who just called." Rockie said, coming into my room when Taylor and I were in mid make-out. I giggled at getting caught but didn't bother to respond, just stare at my ginger some more.

Rockie huffed. "Well...aren't you going to guess?" She asked impatiently, tapping her foot to get my attention.

I turned away from Taylor and rolled my eyes defiantly. "No." I replied, trying to hide my smirk.

"Whyyy not?" My best friend whined and I continued to keep a straight face.

"Because you said I'd never guess, remember?" I said, keeping my expression blank despite the fact that Taylor was outright laughing at my comment.

"Always a smart alec." Rockie said, rolling her eyes at me though she had a smile on her lips.

"But seriously, you'll never guess who just called." Rockie said again, her caremel eyes pleading with me to play along.

"I give up, I give up." I said, holding up my hands in fake defeat.

"So who is the mystery caller?" Taylor asked, playing with a strand of my dark black hair absentmindedly.

"Krystal Graves." Rockie said, doing a small drum roll before she made the announcement.

I rolled my brown eyes again. "Aren't you done obsessing over her yet? We've gone to school with her for two months, she invited us to her party, clearly she's a normal kid."

"Bu-" Rockie said, that excitement still in her eyes.

"No buts." I said sternly. "I want you to treat her like a normal kid. She's had enough of the fame seekers in her life, I'm sure. She's my friend, Rock, and I'm sure she'd be yours too if you quit idolizing her for two seconds."

"Bu-" Rockie said again, then corrected herself when she saw the stern look on my face. "I mean..." She said, clearing her throat. "She invited us to dinner."

She paused dramatically, waiting for it to sink in. When I stared blankly at her, she continued, a little exasperated. "At her house...?" She baited, but I still didn't catch on.

"With her parents...?" She continued and finally I got it. Rockie wanted to meet the mother, and fashion icon, Monique.

I rolled my eyes as well as Taylor did. I smiled briefly at my carrot-top before turning back at Rockie. "If we go," I said, holding my hand up when she started bouncing up and down giddily, "_if_ we go, will you promise not to embarrass me?" I asked seriously.

She nodded frantically, but I pressed on. "No, I'm serious. Krystal is my friend and although her dad gives me the creeps, I don't want to make a bad impression on her mom. And if one of my sisters is acting up then there is no_ way_that I'll have any chance at keeping Krys in my life."

"I promise, cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye..." She chanted, doing the hand signals for it as she said it.

"So what exactly did Krystal say on the phone?" Taylor asked, rubbing calming circles on my back since he could see I was jittery.

"Well, at first she said she just wanted Lexi to go but then I was, like, 'hey she'd feel more comfortable with some of us,' so she got off the phone for a minute and when she got back on she said her parents said it'd be okay if Taylor and I could go." Rockie said, smiling widely in triumph.

"I already talked to Fran and Patrick," She said, answering my question before I could even ask it, "and they said it was okay as long as Taylor drove and we promised to be home at a decent hour and to get an autograph if it wasn't too much of a burden for Monique. So, of course, that was a no brainer and I said that we would."

I just shook my head at her anticts. This girl was crazy. But that was why she was perfect for the role of my best friend.

"So when is this shindig?" I asked, hoping that it was Friday so I could get out of my study group with Hollis and Emily for the Spanish test next week.

The two of them were extremely prepared and usually ended up just grilling me instead of studying themselves. Audrey would be out of town so I would have no school allies. (Word to the wise: Me no speak espanol.)

"Tonight!" Rockie said, not able to contain herself any more as she began to jump up and down like a little kid instead of the fifteen year old she really was.

"Why so soon?" Taylor asked, startled as well as I was.

Rockie shrugged. "Her mom left Fashion Week early and since her dad got to meet everyone at the party, so does Monique." She squealed. "I can't believe I'm going to meet _Monique Graves_!"

I sighed, lacing up my tennis shoes in preparation to go; this was going to be a long night.


	12. The Connection

Chapter Eleven: The Connection

I don't know who was more excited we were there, Rockie or the Graves'.

As soon as Taylor, Rockie and I knocked on the front door, we were greeted instantly by the woman I assumed was Krystal's mom.

She looked just like Krys, well, except for the eyes; mocha skin, natural frizzy hair that had been straightened and producted until it was perfect, and most importantly, they both had the same warm smile that lit up their faces. She was familiar, like I had seen her in my dreams, but I guess it was just because Rockie and Audrey were obsesed with her.

"Oh my gosh, it's really you!" Monique Graves gushed, pulling slightly on one of my midnight black curls.

Honestly, it felt like I was the celebrity instead of her.

"Um..." I responded stupidly, caught off guard. How much exactly did Krystal tell her about me?

"Yay!" Krystal screeched slightly when she saw us all in the foyer, bounding towards us with her hair flying behind her and trying to keep up. "Rockie, Taylor, Lexi," She greeted us as she informally introduced all of us to the woman standing before us, "this is my mom."

Rockie let out a yelp of excitement, though I wasn't quite sure if she was aware of it or not, and smiled hugely at Monique. "Oh I'd recognize you anywhere, Mrs. Graves." Rockie said to her idol. "I've purchased almost every article of clothing you've come out with, or at least I've tried. Some of that stuff is expensive, but I have all the t-shirts and socks and shoes and..."

She trailed off, her mind racing faster than her words could keep up and she pulled off her jacket to reveal the MG t-shirt she wore. The white shirt had back wings across the breast and the words "I Can Soar" written in cursive in between the wings.

It was one that I had bought for her, though at the time I didn't know it was a Monique Graves' product, because it looked cool. The shirt was actually the way that I told Rockie I had wings. Ironic, I know, and a little cheesy, but it worked nonetheless.

"So I see." Monique said, laughing lightly at my friend, though I kept catching her staring at me out of the corner of her eye.

"Are our guests here?" A man's voice asked from somewhere else in the house and I froze. "I thought I heard the door."

"Yeah, we're in the foyer, honey." Monique said, her eyes still glued on mine.

I had almost forgotten that Krystal's dad was going to be here as well. At her party, he had awkwardly held my hand sort of, and it was just a little strange. Plus his eyes were creepy.

_He_ is_ blind, remember? _Brain said, with almost a smug sound to his voice.

"Will you just shut up?" I asked, not realizing I had said it outloud until Monique gave me a strange look and Taylor stared at me questioningly as well.

"Excuse me?" Monique asked, a slight smile on her face when I muttered that I was just talking to myself and not to mind me. "It's alright, dear. Lexi was it?"

I nodded. "It's Alexis, really." I admitted, "But Lexi seemed less like a little girl and more like myself. Kinda tougher, I guess." I shrugged. "I don't know what people were thinking when they named me."

Monique looked sad for a second, but not as much as Rockie did. She knew I struggled with being abandoned as a baby and not even knowing anything about my parents other than the little bit that Brain has let slip or I've gotten in my visions/nightmares.

When Geo was in the foyer with us, the couple decided to lead us to the dining room for dinner. I imagined that they would have servants or butlers or something with being so famous, but the house continued to remain empty as we made our way to the dining area.

Everyone took their seats-Taylor on my left with Rockie on my right and the family across from us-except for Geo who went to the kitchen. I was about to ask what he was doing when he suddenly returned with the food, his blindness not even seeming to get in the way of carrying the heavy tray.

"Do you need any help, sir?" Taylor asked, looking as skeptical about the man's abilities as I was. Geo and Monique just laughed and even Krystal had a little giggle of her own going on.

"You mean you made this?" Rockie asked, jumping to the next step and they laughed some more at our expense.

"Daddy doesn't need help; he's not disabled." Krystal explained with a embarrassed smile to us. "He can do more than most people can."

"Like what?" I asked, curiously. "Cooking, obviously." I pointed out since it had been hinted at.

"Cooking, fl-driving, marketing." Geo boasted, setting the gourmet grilled chicken and fried rice in front of each of us, not even accidentily spilling any of our water as he reached over the table. "Even have been known to build a bomb or two."

He smiled widely and that's when I made the connection...or rather, Brain made it for me.

Suddenly, my mind was flooded with images from my visions; repeats of someone's history that I hadn't experienced.

The six children were young, the youngest maybe six, and were flying high above a building alone in the desert; the short blonde nodded to the older tall blonde boy with sightless blue eyes who smiled widely and dropped a bomb onto the buiding that exploded below them.

It seemed to have jumped a few years and the blind boy was smiling again, but this time at the dark skinned, slightly younger girl across from him as if she was his whole world. "I love you, Nudge," he said before he leaned in for a kiss.

The past vision jumped a little forward again and he was smiling sadly at a brunette girl with my brown eyes who looked like she was crying as the two stood with the black teenager "Nudge" and the youngest girl at a funeral.

When the visions stopped, I tried to look up, but knew that I didn't have the strength yet. My brain explosions, curtesy of Brain, were usually painful and more than a little annoying. I didn't realize I was gripping my temple until I felt Taylor rubbing it for me.

"Are you alright, Lexi?" Monique asked, and I was reminded of one of the girls from my vision.

"I'm doing just fine, Nudge," I said, covering my mouth with my hand when I realized what I had said.

"What did you call her?" Geo asked in disbelief, his sightless blue eyes shimmering with happiness.

"Lex, what's going on?" Rockie asked, looking between all of us.

'I know them...' I whispered, trying to convey everything and nothing at the same time to her.

"I don't understand..." Taylor said, staring at me strangely. "Do you have another headache?"

"I think I can help explain." Monique said, her face lighting up as she began filling everyone in...

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**AN: Aaaah! A cliffhanger :) Review and I might just post the next chapter today as well. It's up to you guys.**


	13. Freak Out

**AN: Thank you guys sooo much for the reviews. As promised, here's the second chapter even though it's late :)**

Chapter Twelve: Freak Out

"I think I can help explain." Monique said, her face lighting up as she began filling everyone in...

"When you weren't even thought of Lexi, though with your parents I'm not sure that you were ever planned or even thought of..." Monique started, but Taylor cut her off.

"You know who Lex's parents are?" He asked in disbelief. Rockie and Krystal were sitting silently, probably both assuming they knew what was happening.

"Shh, sweetie, let her finish." I said, brushing his arm reassuringly. I had somehow made the connection that Monique, or Nudge, and Geo were somehow my family.

"As I was saying," Monique said, smiling at me. "Long before you were born, there were six of us. A Fl-family of misfits," she looked at her husband with a secret in her eyes, but he shook his head, gesturing to my best friend and boyfriend sitting next to me. "Angel, the Gasman, me-you can call me Nudge by the way, Iggy who you know as Geo, and your parents."

She paused, making sure I was ready to hear more about them. I nodded slightly.

"I've seen pictures in my head, dreams sometimes. There were six kids, you two included...oh, and the little black Yorkie dog." I added, remembering a few of my visions/mind attacks.

That seemed to take her off guard. Geo, I mean Iggy, too.

"Who told you about Total?" Iggy asked, confused and startled.

"Brain." I answered, looking at Taylor, hoping he wouldn't be freaking out. He didn't know anything about my wings, or the voice in my head, or my visions, or anything that was essentially me.

"You have a Voice too?" Iggy asked, puzzled once again. He glanced at Nudge with bewilderment in his sightless blue eyes, somehow able to "look" at her without technically being able to see her.

"I know she had one too." I said, refering to my mom. "Actually, from the way Brain talks, I think that it might be the same one..."

"How is that even possible?" Nudge asked, more to herself than to us. "We always thought that Max's Voice was Jeb; but he's been dead for years."

"Her name was Max?" I asked, greedy for information about my mother. This is what I have been waiting for my whole life.

"Still is, last time we heard." Iggy said, sounding nervous. "But Maximum Ride hasn't been around lately."

I almost slapped myself right there. Now that note was starting to make a lot more sense. "Maximum Ride. Maximum Ride? Maximum Ride!" I muttered to myself, giddy. I was left a note in a locket that hung around my neck at all times.

I pulled it out from under my shirt and didn't wait for Iggy and Nudge's reactions as I undid the clasp and pulled out the note. I had always assumed that the ending line "Fly on, Maximum Ride" was more of a smudge instead of a comma-"fly on maximum ride"-as a joke about my wings from my normal parents cursed with a winged child.

I read it outloud now, blissfully accepting the new news:

_I'm so sorry that I couldn't keep you. It pains me to do so, but I have to give you up for a normal life. -Now I know she meant for me and not her._

_Stay strong, stay brave, and stay true. Whatever you do, remember that I love you and you're safe here._

_Fly on,_

_Maximum Ride_

"My mother left me this." I said, I added, as if it wasn't obvious.

"That sounds just like her." Iggy said at the same time Nudge said, "Fang couldn't have known."

"Fang was the father?" Taylor asked, his face pale with all of this new information. Maybe I shouldn't have brought him for this.

"Yes. We all got to pick our names, and he was a biter when we were at the School." Nudge said. "He was Max's world, her first love, and apparently the father of her only child."

"And he was _like me_?" I asked, even though my visions told me that the six of them had wings.

"If you're talking about what I think you're talking about," Nudge answered, looping in circles to keep Rockie and Taylor out of the conversation so as not to implicate ourselves, "then yes."

"Well, where is everybody now?" I asked, curious to meet my parents and the other two members of my family.

"Gazzy died sixteen years ago, Fang took off before then, Max apparently had you while keeping it hidden from all of us and we haven't seen her in twelve years, and Angel and Total were just in town a few months ago." Iggy explained.

"They just left? They split up just like that?" I asked, almost upset. I had always seen the six of them together in my visions, or a few of them but always a group. Them splitting up didn't seem right.

"We were suffering. Max was distant, though now we know that she was just dealing with hidding her growing stomach, so when she disappeared suddenly, Fang took off after her and hadn't been seen by anyone since." Iggy said. "Gazzy died right after Max returned from giving you up so things were even more tense."

"It was just too hard after awhile." Nudge said sadly.

We all sat in silence after that, not sure what to say or how to say it.

"Um..." Rockie said, trying to break the silence. "Since you said you guys are like Lexi, can, um, I maybe see them?" She asked and everyone but Taylor knew that she was asking about wings.

And that was when my beautiful redhead started to freak out.


	14. Exposed

Chapter Thirteen: Exposed

"What is it that you guys are hiding?" Taylor asked, anger and hurt in his voice. His cheeks were as red as his hair and I almost took a step backwards. If I hadn't grown up on the streets, I probably would have.

"What are you talking about? We're not hiding anything." Nudge said a little too quickly and everyone could see the lie on her face, as well as in her reply.

"Yes you are." My beautiful ginger said angrliy, his Irish temper coming out. "And for who knows what reason, I'm the only one not in on this secret."

He shot Rockie and me glares. Though the one to me was less severe, I still got chills. Even being ready to kill someone to find out the secret, he still looked absolutely kissable. Actually, I was kind of turned on at the sight of him this angry for once. He was usually so even-tempered.

"I don't know what you'r-" Iggy started to say, but I cut him off.

"I think there's something that you need to see, Taylor." I said, pulling my jacket off to reveal my baby pink halter top. "Something I should have shown you a long time ago."

I swore I'd never tell him in case he thought I was a freak and dumped me, but now it didn't matter. I might lose him anyways and then what good would it have done?

Taylor Spearman was my soul mate and if I had to spend the rest of my life regretting telling him or regretting not telling him, I would rather have everything out in the open.

"You can't be serious," Krystal said, looking between us with panic.

Exposing myself meant exposing the rest of them; Monique was a famous icon who had managed to stay hidden and under the radar while still being a public figure. Not to mention what it would mean if word got out around school.

"I trust Taylor with my life." I swore. "Please, just let me do this."

"If he tells, you know what has to happen..." Iggy said half threateningly, half sad. I knew that he was implying a memory swipe or a beating to make him forget...or worse.

"Rockie has known for months and has kept the secret. I think Taylor is just as trustworthy." I added on my boyfriend's behalf.

"Rockie knew?" Taylor asked in disbelief. "You could tell her but you couldn't tell your own boyfriend? I thought what we had was special? How could you not trust me, Lex?"

"I do trust you," I said, desperate for him to believe me, "more than you know. More than you will ever know."

He seemed to be prosessing this, and though there was still anger in his expression, he seemed to calm down slightly.

"So, what's this big secret that you could tell Rock but not me?" Taylor asked, and I could tell that he was angry again. Yup, there was definitely no going back now.

I slowly rolled my shoulder muscles, feeling the tiny bump start to show to the visible eye on my back, and closed my eyes.

Rockie had been the only one to ever see my wings, and for me to show them to Taylor in front of three other people, well it was taking everything I had not to turn around and run for the hills.

When I felt the first feather start to make its way out of my back, I counted to three and pushed them out as quickly as I could.

It wasn't painful to do, but I wanted to get it over with as soon as possible. With my wings fully extended, I felt vulnerable and embarrassed. Normal teenage girls had it easy.

I opened my eyes when I heard gases, but I expected that from Nudge and Krystal. I did not expect my beautiful ginger to curse at the sight of my wings. I tucked them in quickly, my cheeks flaming red as I tried to cover it with my dark hair.

"Oh, my gosh." Nudge stated, her lips formiing sentence after sentence as she tried to describe my wings to her husband. "They look just like Fang's, dark black wing with a purple tint to them, but like Max's at the same time, the tips are the same tan speckled color. Though Max's always were like fuller and, like, her whole wings were speckled while Lexi's look like they don't have hardly any in the tips..." She kept describing it to Iggy, but I tuned her out.

My eyes were focused on Taylor instead. His reaction was my only concern at the moment.

Taylor's green eyes were the size of saucers, his mouth open in shock, and his face looked overall like he had been hit by a two-by-four and then told that it was all his fault to begin with.

"Say something." I would have begged, if I was one to beg in the first place. Begging was for the weak, and I was anything but weak. As it was, I more of demanded it instead of begged. But Taylor knew me, and he knew what I meant when I used that tone.

When he still looked shocked and didn't say anything, I tried again. "Say something, Taylor."

"I-I have to get out of here." He said at long last, and my heart sank. This was the opposite reaction I was going for.

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**AN: Sorry it took so long, I had the chapter written but I couldn't post it. If anyone has an idea about Taylor's reaction and if he should reveal it and send the Graves/Shadows flock on the run, or if he should accept her in the next chapter and I just continue going how I was. As always, reviews are my best friend :)**


	15. Heartbroken and Shell Shocked

Chapter Fourteen: Heat-broken and Shell Shocked

"Well, that went better than I thought." Iggy said, his baby blues scoping out the room even though he couldn't see our expressions.

Krystal and Nudge had identical shocked expressions, though they were mother and daughter and from what I've gotten to know about them recently, they were completely the same anyways, so that was expected. They looked completely stunned that someone would react like that, especially the guy who had been sitting across from them at dinner and had been so delightful; welcome to my world.

Rockie seemed to be the only one who knew what was going on inside my head because she knew how hard it had been for me to open up to her and she knew how much I cared about Taylor. She tried to reach out and hug me, but since she knew how much I hated that kind of affection, so her outstretched hands hung limply in the air after a second and she retracted them back towards her body.

Right now, I was heartbroken and ashamed and scared and just confused in my head, but my expression remained blank and I probably looked like nothing was wrong. I had gotten good at my poker face over the years and had perfected it; if I looked in a mirror right now, I would probably think that nothing was wrong with me either.

"Yeah," I muttered to no one in particular, my mind too fragile right now to think straight. I started pacing back and forth, my shoulders held back and my head high, while I debated what to do.

On the one hand, I wanted to give Taylor space so I wouldn't freak him out again and then he'd never accept me; but on the other hand, I knew that if I didn't go talk to him now, I would never forgive myself and he would probably still be just as confused and possibly rat out my new bird family.

That decided it. My new little bird people were counting on me to quiet Taylor. Even if he hated me for lying to him or thought that I was a freak that he was afraid of, I had to convince him to not go public with this news.

Besides, he was our ride home and I knew that Fran would kill all of us if we didn't come home together.

"I'll be back." I muttered, glancing at Rockie to make sure she would be okay here on her own until I came back with Taylor. She nodded, understanding what I was talking about, and shooed me out.

I followed his scent (yeah, I know I sound freaky but that's just part of the extra perks that come with being part animal) until I could see him. He had climbed a tree like he always did when he ran away-which he wasn't really known to do lately, but Patrick said that when he was younger he had. He was pretty high up, at least two building stories, and I wondered how long after he left the room that he chose this tree.

I stood at the base of the tree until he noticed me. He glanced at me for half a second before his eyes turned dark and he looked away. Oh well, that was enough of confirmation for me.

I would have just flew up there, but it would probably have freaked him out even more. The wings were probably going to be a sore subject for us for awhile. Instead, when he finally spotted me down below, I climbed up the dark bark like he had.

I took the little bit of the branch next to him, thankful that I was incredibly light due to my genes, and tried to get him to look at me. Instead, he kept staring straight forward as if I wasn't even there.

"You're gonna have to talk to me eventually, Tay." I said, watching him flinch when I used my nickname for him.

We sat in silence, him staring forward and me desperately trying to get him to look at me. At long last, I reached forward to touch his arm, but the second my hand got anywhere near his bare skin, he pulled away in a haste.

"Fine, be that way." I said angrily, shoving myself off of the branch in one swift motion. I wiped out my wings and was about to fly off when suddenly I felt something against one of my feathers.

I turned around and caught Taylor's eyes, he looked away and released his automatic grip on my wings when I had tried to storm off.

"Sorry," he said automatically, his green eyes looking at me for half a second before staring down at his lap.

"...you can touch them if you want." I prompted, extending the wing closest to him out farther.

Hesitantly, he examined my wing tips, taking them in his hands gently and rubbing his thumb across them.

"It-it's really real..." Taylor said dumbfoundedly, his eyes met mine and for the first time that night he held it. "Ho-how did you do it?"

I raised an eyebrow at him so he continued. "How did you hide them? How did you get them? Can you really fly?" He asked the normal questions that Rockie had asked.

"My parents were special too," I said, starting with the easiest question, "or at least that's what Monique was saying in the house."

"And the wings work?" He asked, his expression less confused and more curious now.

I nodded, pulling them back into my back and feeling completely relaxed when they weren't out in the open anymore, even if Taylor was the only one in miles to see them.

"Some time I'll show you." I promised, kissing his cheek timidly since I wasn't sure if he had forgiven me for not telling him about them sooner.

As if mirroring my thoughts, he asked, "Why couldn't you tell me about the w-wings earlier?"

"Because you freaked out, Tay." I stated, shrugging my shoulders. "I guess I just didn't want to lose you just because of this secret. The wings are apart of me, just like my parents' absence is apart of me, but you are my life now and I just couldn't risk losing you."

"Lexi, you could never lose me." Taylor said, pulling me in for a long, breath-stealing, hot-n-steamy, too intense to talk about kiss in the trees.

"I-I love you." I blurted out when we pulled apart and my cheeks immediately flushed red.

"You do?" Taylor asked, his face lit up like Christmas. I simply nodded, too embarrassed to say anything. Though we both assumed the other loved each other, the three "magic" words had never been actually spoken.

"Good," Taylor said, kissing me gently, "because I love you too."

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**AN: Awww :) As requested, Taylor has accepted Lexi :) Thanks for the reviews, and please keep them coming. Any ideas suggested will be written so what you wanna see happen just let me know. **

**BTW, if I can get five reviews for this chapter, one of the Flock will get to meet Lexi in the next chapter :) **


	16. Angel

**AN: Special thanks to **"Oh I'm Crazy" **for making the count. **

**As always, love your reviews...here comes Angel :) (you didn't think I'd make it that easy to find Max or Fang, did you? lol)**

* * *

Chapter Fifteen: Angel

Taylor and I walked back to Monique Graves' house hand-n-hand, happy to have resolved his freak out, but more importantly, happy that we both said those three little words that still had my heart racing just thinking about it.

I bet Rockie could never have guessed that her fashion idol would also be a link to my family tree. Nudge and Iggy were cool, and I could see why my parents hung out with them, but I really wanted to find my parental units.

After sixteen years of not knowing anything, now I was suddenly flooded with information about my past and it was only fueling my desire.

When we arrived, Rockie was staring awstruck at the Graves family. The three of them had their wings pulled out to show them off.

Iggy's were just as I imagined them-pale tan feathers from top to bottom-and completed his "human ice cream cone" look.

Nudge's wings were tawny russett and seemed to just flow from her back like a hawk's would and my mind instantly jumped to an image that Brain showed me when she was about Krystal's age, flying with hawks and my dad.

Krystal's I was the most surprised to see; her wings were almost gold looking, though I knew it was just the color brown reflecting in the light. Still, I had only ever seen mental images of the Flock so seeing Krystal's was surprising.

"Wow," Taylor said, letting out an impressed whistle as he took in the sight as well. Between the three of them, they were taking up almost the entire room with their wingspans.

"Ah, he lives, then?" Iggy teased, throwing a smirk in our direction.

"Oh, but out," Nudge teased him back, pulling in her wings and wrapping her arms around his torso. He pulled back his wings as well and Krystal quickly followed. Nudge turned to me, "though I am glad that you guys made up."

"Telling people about wings is really hard to do, not that I'd ever know since Mom and Dad say it's too dangerous for us to tell anyone what with Mom being famous and all, but I understand what you're going through." Krystal rambled and I smiled at my friend.

It was hard to believe that when I first met her, I thought she was a stalker. If I had only paid more attention, I would have noticed that she was "like me;" wind blown hair every morning, random twigs or leaves stuck to the back of her shirt sometimes, and more importantly, how she smelled like a bird.

"Excuse me a second," Iggy said, leaving the room abruptly and going to the door which hadn't been rung. But there was no need with a guy who could hear anyone coming from miles away.

When he returned, he had a twenty-something brunette and a small Yorkie at his heels.

"Angel?" I asked, recognizing her features from one of my stored images in my brain.

The woman giggled like a child and suddenly her hair was the color of straw and the ringlets were bouncing into place. "I really thought I could trick you." She admitted at last.

The dog rolled his eyes and I smiled, "Total!" I ran and picked him up, knowing where his tickle spot was thanks to Brain's trip down the Flock's memory lane all the time.

"It really is you, isn't it?" The dog asked, his tiny yapper speaking fluidly so I could hear him perfectly as if he had been a human.

Taylor and Rockie's minds were just blown again and I thought I saw Taylor sit down in defeat.

"I feel like I've known you all my life." I admitted, looking around the room at the 'familiar' faces.

"That's what your Voice is for," Angel said, tapping her temple with a smile. "I had one for a month or two, some scientist's cruel joke or attempt to make me take over, but it was nothing like Max's."

"I have that one now." I stated, "Or at least, that's what it keeps saying."

The two of us were so busy conversing that we didn't notice Krystal come up behind us. "Auntie Angel!" She squealed, wrapping her small mocha arms around Angel.

"Hey there, kid." Angel responded just as enthusiastically.

"So what brings you here, tonight of all nights?" Iggy asked, smiling at his 'little sister.'

"I had a vision of a girl coming here looking like the spitting image of my leaders and I just had to see for myself." Angel said.

"So you're a psychic?" Rockie asked, now seeming ready to jump in on the conversation.

Angel nodded, "At first it was only a glimpse or two, but now that the rest of my mental abilities have grown, I can search for the Flock's paths."

"So you know where my parents are?" I asked, not willing to get my hopes up again just to be let down. I needed the truth.

Angel just shrugged. "They're harder to track since their minds are closed off, but I know where Fang was last week. It's a delay since I have to completely dig to find anything on the two of them. Max I haven't 'felt' since Krystal was born and both of us visited. She completely closed her mind off that day."

"But I could find them?" I asked, "It's not impossible?"

"In theory, I guess." Angel admitted at last, though her faith in her abilities wasn't very strong.


	17. Just Another Runaway

Chapter Sixteen: Just Another Runaway

We talked about the possibility of finding Fang for almost an hour. Angel said he was last 'seen' at a diner in Henderson, Tennessee a week ago. He had paid cash, ordered from the drive-thru, then left. It wasn't much to go on, but at least I knew where to start.

At half past eight, Taylor started staring at his watch. We were supposed to be back at the Spearman's by nine.

"I'm sorry," Taylor finally interupted ten minutes 'til, "but we have to go now or we'll miss curfew."

I hastly said goodbye to the Graves family and Angel Feathers, promising that I would come back tomorrow after school and we'd all talk again. Little did they know that I wasn't going to be going to school at all. My dad was too close to just let slip through my fingers. I was going to find him if it was the last thing I did.

On the way back to the Spearman's, it was quiet. Taylor was so caught up in his thoughts and trying to make sense of all that he learned that he didn't notice my vacant expression. Rockie was quiet because she did.

When we had arrived safely, Rockie headed to her room as soon as the car had stopped. Taylor said in his seat, a thousand questions running through his mind, but he never said a word. Instead, he just sat there.

Finally, when I knew for sure that Patrick would come out here soon, I pulled on his arm. "Come on, we have to go inside now, Tay."

"Nothing's changed." He muttered more to himself than to me.

"What?" I asked, completely lost-which hardly ever happened to me.

"Nothing's changed." He said again, this time looking at me. "We're still making curfew, Mom and Dad are still waiting for us inside, and the little ones are fast asleep. Nothing's changed. I just thought that with this new revalation, something would feel different, but it's exactly the same."

"We've changed." I said, kissing him lightly yet trying to hold on to the feeling of his lips on mine since I wasn't sure when I'd be back. "You and I, we're different now." I said, allowing him to kiss me harder when I spoke against his lips.

"You love me..." I prompted, hoping he'd say it one more time before I left so I could picture this moment forever.

Taylor pulled away and grinned like a maniac, "I love you, Lexi." He said, catching my drift.

Hearing those words almost changed my mind; I was seconds away from saying 'screw it' and not going after my father, but that was too important to me and I knew that Taylor would eventually understand why I had to go.

"I love you too, Tay." I said back, pulling his lips to mine hungrily. I was going to miss this everyday.

When the front porch lights started flickering, we broke apart with flushed cheeks both from embarrassment and lack of air on his part.

He walked me to the bottom of the stairs since there was a 'no boy' rule upstairs thanks to the two of us, and I kissed him on the cheek goodnight since Fran and Patrick were monitoring us from the couch with steady eyes.

I ran up the stairs two at a time, feeling completely lightheaded.

I was about to do the stupidest thing I had ever done-walk away from my 'perfect' life here in search of a _possible _lead on my father's wareabouts. I knew it was foolish, but I also knew that I had to do it. I had gone sixteen years without my parents and I was not going to let another birthday pass without them.

When I was safely in my shared room, I looked around for Rockie. She was sitting on her bed next to two full backpacks. She looked like she had dumped out school supplies on the floor, because that's where I spotted them, to fill the bags with the essentials.

"What's all this?" I asked, picking up one of the bags to find a random assortment of my clothes shoved in it.

"You're going after your father," Rockie stated, "and I'm going with you."

That's when I looked through the other bag. It was filled with her clothes and toothbrush and other random things that she decided was important. I noticed that GinaBear was at the very bottom, her pink fur raggedy yet recognizable. Rockie had been given the bear by her older sister who died in a car crash long before her mother remarried to that jerk who beat Rock.

"You can't come." I said sternly, not wanting to upset her but knowing that I would make faster time if I flew. Carrying her would also slow me considerably down. I didn't have any extra time to waste, my lead was already a week old.

"Why not?" Rockie asked in disbelief. "We're best friends, Crew members, and...well, I thought we were like sisters." She said the last part as if I had offended her.

"Of course we are." I said, rolling my eyes. "That's why you _have_ to stay here."

She raised an eyebrow, clearly not believing me.

"There isn't anyone I trust more than you, Rock, not even Taylor, which is why you have to stay here to make sure he doesn't freak out and tell the secret or Fran starts asking questions." I said. "You need to stay here so that nothing suspicious happens."

She still didn't look convinced so I tried a different tactic. "I'm a runner," I stated, "it's in my file and every foster parent I've had knows it. If I were to disappear in the middle of the night, I would be just another runaway."

"But you," I said, looking her in the eyes, "have only ever been here and your real house. You love it here and if you disappeared with me, then Fran would probably call the cops and we wouldn't get a mile away."

"It's not fair for me to let you go by yourself." Rockie said at last. "Who's going to take care of you if I'm not there?" She half teased, though I could see the panic in her words.

"I'll be fine," I said, more to myself than to her, "and hopefully I'll be back in a few days with my dad so it won't matter."

"You really think you'll find him?" Rockie asked, getting to the heart of the question like usual.

I nodded, "I've got a lead, some cash that I stole from Monique's house when we first arrived, and two wings to take me there. I'll find my dad even if it kills me."

_I wouldn't say that. _Brain said to me, but I ignored him. He hadn't been any help to me thus far, so why should I listen to him now? I was on my own and I was fine with that.


	18. Birds of a Feather

Chapter Seventeen: Birds of a Feather

Ten minutes after flying, I pulled out the old laptop that Fran had gotten for me when I first arrived. All the Spearman's adoptive/foster children had one though mine was unique-the black cover had wings traced on the back that I did when I first arrived. It had also been tricked out by Hollis so that it ran ten times faster.

Ghost had shown all of the Crew how to get past firewalls so I could effectively hack into any system within ten miles, which was what I was doing now. I needed internet to get directions, or at least a map, so I wasn't flying aimlessly. I had never flown more than a state away when I was running away before, but now I was on a long distance mission.

According to Angel, my father was last 'seen' at a diner in Henderson, Tennessee a week ago so that was where I was going to start. From LA to Henderson, it was roughly 1,899 miles and about a thirty hour drive, so flying (not counting stops) it should take about twenty-four hours.

Unfortunately, I would have to stop in every state to rest and find food; Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and finally Tennesse.

It was right about now, when I shoved the laptop back in my bag and hit the skies again that I realized I was finally doing it. I was finally going to find my parents. It caused me to stop midair for a second and grin widely.

The night was chilly, but my green windbreaker was enough to keep the crisp air from giving me a cold. I whistled quietly to myself to keep from getting completely bored all by myself. I had gotten too comfortable in the last nine months at the Spearman's that now I didn't know how to be by myself anymore.

'Are you going to be thinking like this the whole time?' A voice said in my head and I dropped a few feet in the air. This was definately NOT Brain's voice.

"Who's there?" I asked, looking around frantically for the mind intruder.

About a mile behind me was a vision of white-also known as Angel. She giggled in my head and I slowed down so she could catch up.

"What are you doing here?" I asked when she was in speaking distance.

"I couldn't let you go by yourself." She responded in a 'duh' tone, echoing Rockie's earlier words.

"But how did you know that I was going to go after Fang?" I asked as we picked up our pace a little bit, our wings now syncronized.

"When I told you about my vision, you had a look on your face so I assumed you'd do something about the news. Besides, I know your parents," Angel said with a sad smile, "and you're just like them."

"Really?" I asked, beaming on the inside at the compliment.

Angel nodded. "Strong, determined, not afraid to go the distance, and most of all, you appreciate family."

"But how could they have appreciated their family if they both left me and the rest of the Flock?" I asked, my eyes squinting slightly against the wind.

"You'll have to ask them that when we find them." Angel said sadly. "Because I'm not quite sure myself."

We flew on in silence for awhile, neither of us having very much to say to the other. At long last, I asked her why Iggy, Nudge, and Krystal didn't go after me too.

"I told them I'd handle this. Nudge had to get back to Paris soon, but more importantly, they didn't want Krystal to ever know what it was like to live on the run and not have a comfortable home like she has now. They've worked too hard for their perfect little lives and even though they want to find Max and Fang too, they aren't ready to give that all up."

"I just don't get it." I said a few minutes later. "In my visions or whatever from the Brain, the Flock always seemed like a unit. There weren't any individual people-only 'the Flock.' I don't see what happened to change that."

Angel sighed, her eyes scanning the area in front of us. It was nearly morning and we were flying past the Arizona border as we spoke, but it felt like we had only just left. "A lot of things changed. We had been little kids when this all started, but as time went on and the world was finally close to saved, we were different people."

"Max leaving for a few months to deliver you really set things in motion." Angel said, looking at me to show that it wasn't my fault. "Fang left in search of her, or maybe he left just to get away, and when she came back, we all knew nothing would be the same."

"Then my brother died," Angel said, "and things were too hard. Max disappeared and made some sort of deal with Jeb to keep the rest of our experation dates away, but when she returned she was even more broken."

"I guess I'll never understand it." I said at long last, the silence dragging on as we flew above vast areas of nothing and trees. The morning light was streaming in our faces and I fought back a yawn.

Instead of answering, Angel swooped her wings lower to take her to a lower altitude and she began coasting downwards gayly.

"What are you doing?" I asked, following her lead and trying to copy her motions. "Where are you going?" I asked, but my question remained unanswered.

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**AN: Review and guess; come on lol I know you see what's coming :) **


	19. We Are Family

Chapter Eighteen: We Are Family

"Angel, where are you going?" I asked again, following her closely as we descended downwards. She made no motion to answer me, only kept flying. Her face was determined and hopeful; so, of course, I was worried.

We had only been flying a few hours, since I left at around one when Rockie was asleep in case she tried to follow me, and now the sun was coming up. The forest we were nearing was dense, unfamiliar, and completely in the middle of nowhereland, Arizona.

"I'm not going to keep following you if you don't tell me where you're going!" I threatened. "I'm serious, Angel, I'm turning around right now." I bluffed, but it was enough.

She stopped midair, spinning gracefully in a complete circle to face me. "It'd really benefit you to follow me." Angel said, not saying anything else and just waiting for me to choose one option or the other.

"Just tell me where we're going." I said stubbornly.

"Just like your father," Angel said with a small smile, "always wanting a reason for everything."

"I'm serious, Angel." I said, not willing to get distracted. I didn't completely trust her, though I trusted her more than most people I've known in my life.

"Just trust me." Angel said at long last. "It's a leap of faith, and I'm not even sure it's going to pan out, but just trust me, okay?"

I nodded slowly, realizing this was as much information as Angel was going to give me, and motioned for her to keep leading me. We touched down a minute later and I winced when my wings hit a branch coming down.

"Fudge nuggets! Dirty rotten carrot cake!" I said angrily, earning a small chuckle from Angel.

"What?" I asked, glaring at Angel with fury.

"N-" Angel said, startled by my glare and unconsiously she took a step backwards. "Wow, that's really uncanny."

"What?" I asked, softening my expression a little and rolling my shoulders to hide my wings in my back since they weren't hurting anymore.

"When I first met you, I thought you were the most like Fang. The hair, the skin, the nose, I mean you look like a minature version of him only the girl version."

"Gee, thanks." I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes and putting my hands on my hips.

"But you are definately more like Max." Angel said, boinking one of my curls playfully. I scowled and shook my head to get her to not touch me. I didn't like being touched, hugged, or anything of that sort. "Your whole manarizm is hers. Like I said, it's a little uncanny."

"That was her glare, by the way." She said as she started walking in a seemingly random direction. "Classic 'Max glare.' She would give them to all of us. Though I rarely got one myself..." Angel admitted, shaking her head at a memory.

We walked on in silence and before I knew it, we were standing in front of a small house surrounded by trees on both sides. There was a stone pathway leading from the driveway to the house and a wooden rocking chair on the porch. Toys littered the front lawn and an old model minivan was parked in the drive.

"I don't understand," I said, looking around at the perfect little house hidden in the forest. "Why are we here?"

"You'll see." Angel said, walking purposefully towards the house, not bothering to walk on the path clearly laid out for people to walk on. "We're here to see someone from our past, or rather, your parents and my past."

I followed behind with nervous excitement. Meeting people that my parents knew was exciting and all, but I was on a mission. I had a lead on my father's wearabouts and that was more important than Angel playing catch up with a kid from way back when.

"What time is it?" Angel asked, glancing at the watch from Taylor that was on my wrist. It was one of the few presents that I had ever gotten in my life so it was treasured, like my mom's necklace always around my neck.

"5:29. Why?" I asked, waiting for her to knock already. This was precious time we were wasting. "Afraid that we'll wake them up?"

"No," Angel said with a low chuckle, "they're up."

She knocked on the door and a man with brown hair, coal eyes, and a weary smile answered the door. He recognized Angel and let us in. He introduced himself as Alejandro Garcia to me before excusing himself to go round up his kids for breakfast. And, boy did he have kids. I spotted four in the kitchen and living room alone.

A little boy with dark hair was chasing a younger brunette girl around the kitchen. He had a fake snake in his hands and kept making hissing sounds to scare her.

It was working though, because she kept yelling "ayuda!" which if the two lessons of Spanish Fran forced on me taught me anything, it was "help." I grabbed the boy's hand and made him release the rubber snake about the fifth time they ran past us when I finally got tired of hearing the girl scream.

A woman with dark hair and brown eyes stood on the stairs watching us. I thought she was sizing up me as a threat to her children, but when I looked up again, she was making her way towards me with a smile on her face.

"Oh my god, Alexis, you have no idea how good it is to see you again." She said, wrapping her arms around me in a hug. "You've gotten so big!"

This statement shocked Angel who I guess wanted me to be a surprise. Angel gasped while I just squirmed and tried to get out of the woman's grip.

"Oh, sorry, so sorry." The woman said, laughing lightly. "It's just so good to see you, Alexis. I bet I'm freaking you out, but I'm not some crazy stalker." She said, pulling out of the one-sided hug. "I bet you don't remember me, but I'm your Auntie Ella."

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**AN: Aw, I'm kind of sad that no one figured out where they were going. Though some of you were kind of close.**


	20. Secrets Told

Chapter Nineteen: Secrets Told

The strange woman said, pulling out of the one-sided hug. "I bet you don't remember me, but I'm your Auntie Ella."

"Ella, you knew?" Angel asked in disbelief and Ella let go of her hold on me and stepped back to examine me closely while still glancing at Angel every few seconds.

The woman claiming to be my aunt shrugged. "I was her sister, of course she told me."

"Like real blood sister?" I asked, knowing that Krystal claimed Angel as an aunt and the two didn't have an ounce of the same DNA from what I've learned.

"We have the same mother, so we're only half sisters, but it's the most family that Max has left." Ella admitted, frowning slightly at another memory. "She had a full brother who was 'special' too, but he died a long time ago. And her father disappeared right after you were given up. I saw in the newspaper the other day that he hung himself in Central Park..."

I winced at the thought of my grandfather killing himself, but from the looks that Ella and Angel were giving, I guess it was better that I never met him.

"What about my grandmother? You said that you guys shared the same mom, so where is she?" I asked.

"She had a massive heart attack last year." Ella said, close to tears. She rubbed her eyes to keep them at bay and sniffed.

At long last, she finally replied. "Yeah, but anyways, I'm the only family Max has left. I was the closest person to her when she was pregnant that she thought wouldn't tell, so I got to meet you a long time ago."

"Was I the only one who didn't know what was going on?" Angel asked mostly under her breath, but Ella heard her anyways.

"If it makes you feel any better, I was only called because of my pre-med training." Ella said, trying to calm the bird woman next to me.

"You helped deliver me?" I asked, shuddering slightly at the thought of it. Ella nodded with an embarrassed smile, obviously thinking the same thoughts as I was.

"All I'm saying is that I should have been informed too." Angel said with a huff. "Not knowing what split up the Flock has killed me over the last sixteen years and finding out that you knew this whole time doesn't help any."

"I'm sorry," Ella said, her heart shaped face turning downwards in a worried frown. "Max swore me to secrecy and said that I wasn't to tell a soul or else she'd tell Iggy I had a crush on him."

"You had a crush on Iggy?" I asked, my eyes snapping up to meet hers.

"It was a long time ago." Ella said. "He was a cool bird kid that could do amazing things despite being blind and I envied him as well as admired him...but when Nudge told me in secret that she was in love with him, well, I knew that he wasn't mine to crush on anyways." She turned to Angel, "How's Krystal, by the way? I haven't seen my little niece since her last photo shoot in Prague."

"Oh, Krystal's fine." I said, startling Ella.

"You've seen them then?" She asked, her eyes lighting up when I nodded. "Max really didn't know what she was doing, trying to give you a normal life. You've obviously tracked down the Flock."

"Actually, it was by chance that Krystal and I went to the same school." I said, shrugging. Though I wanted to meet my parents, I had no idea that a whole crazy family came with it. "Then when Iggy met me, he made the connection and called Nudge in from Paris."

"Total!" One of the little girls yelled, interrupting us and running up to Angel. She frowned when the black Yorkie didn't jump out of her backpack.

"I'm sorry, Lena, but Total isn't here." Angel said with a glance at Ella.

"Well where is he?" Lena asked, her attitude dominant for only being maybe eight.

"Krystal wanted to spend time with the doggie too." Angel said in her best 'patronizing a little kid' voice.

When she ran off, I looked around and did a head count again. There were two more children than before and Ella's husband had an infant in his arms as well. "You sure have a lot of kids." I said, letting out a low whistle.

"Alejandro came from a big family and since I was from a small one, it only seemed fair to have a lot." Ella said with a shrug. "You want to meet your cousins?"

"That's my oldest boy, Armando," Ella pointed at the twelve year old brunette that looked just like her.

"Estella is ten and a half, though she'll tell you she's nine because she admires her brother so much." I glanced at the girl with glasses and dark hair next to the little boy with dark hair who had a snake earlier. "Estaban is our little trouble maker, but he's harmless."

"These are my girls, Ana and Sophia. They just turned six." I looked at the girls Ella pointed at. One was the brunette girl that the snake boy had chased and the other looked nearly identical to her, though this one didn't have a scar on her forehead.

"Geovani is four," dark hair, light eyes, "and Raquel is a year now." She pointed at the baby in her husband's arms with bright eyes and fair hair.

"That's my best friend's name." I said, thinking about how Rockie was doing right now.

"Great minds think alike, huh?" Ella said before ushering all of her children, minus Raquel out the door for school. Their father loaded them in the minivan and they were gone within minutes.

"Ella, I need a favor." Angel said once we were alone.

"Anything." Ella agreed even though she didn't know what she was getting herself into.

"I need you to tell me where Max is." Angel said, her face not showing any emotion as she put on her determined expression.

"You know that she doesn't want to be contacted." Ella said with a frown. "She only let me know where she was in case she was in serious trouble and needed backup. But I haven't spoken to her in over a year."

"That's eleven sooner than I have." Angel said with some distaste.

"I don't know...she was really adamant about it." Ella said and I could tell that she wasn't going to tell Angel.

"You can't tell Angel, fine." I said, startling them both. "Tell me instead. I'm her daughter and she might have been scared to raise me, but I'm already practically grown."

I could see that Ella was putty in my hands so I went for the final blow. "I just want to get to know my mother, even if it's only for a day. Please, Aunt Ella?"

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**AN: Fang or Max? Who do you want Lexi to go after first? **


	21. On the Road Again

Chapter Twenty: On the Road Again

I could see that Ella was putty in my hands so I went for the final blow. "I just want to get to know my mother, even if it's only for a day. Please, Aunt Ella?"

Unfortunately, at the last second she seemed to have changed her mind. "I'm sorry, Alexis, but I can't tell you where she is." Ella said at last.

"But I'm her daughter, doesn't that take presidents over what she said about not telling the Flock?" I asked, hoping to win Ella over.

She just shook her head. "When she gave you to those nuns, she did it so you could be normal. To have her in your life again would probably upset that."

"But I don't care! My life will always be intertwined with hers, she can't keep denying that." I said half angry at the rejection my mother was giving me despite not even being here and half sad that this was really it and I would never get to know my mother.

"I'm really sorry, Alexis. If there was any other way or if she had left me a loop hole than I would tell you in a heartbeat, but as it is, Max left me with specific instructions, and she makes me swear on Mom's grave not to tell a soul every time she drops in."

"And what exactly were the instructions?" Angel said, hoping that maybe there was a loop hole that Ella hadn't thought about.

"She told me that she left for a reason and only a "dire emergency" could bring her back." Ella said, glancing at a picture on the wall behind her of the young Max from my visions, a woman that looked eerily like Ella, and a young Hispanic girl that I knew was my aunt.

"Mom dying was the only time that I've seen her other than when she visits every year on Gazzy's birthday." An idea struck her and she looked at Angel for approval. "You could just drop by on the fifth." She suggested, but Angel shook her head.

"We don't have a month to wait." Angel said, frustrated, though a little shocked that their leader would come back and visit her brother's grave every year.

"I'm sorry, Angel." Ella said with a hurt expression. "I would tell you if I were able, but you know how Max is when she makes up her mind about something."

"Lately, I can't say that I do." Angel said, still angry though hiding it a little worse than before.

"I'll do you a favor." Ella said, reaching around the counter with the baby still on her hip to find something. She pulled back her hand to reveal a blank piece of paper and a pen. She handed it to Angel who seemed to know what to do. "If you guys aren't back in a month, I'll give Max the letter and try to persuade her to visit Nudge and Iggy again really soon."

"That is where you're staying, isn't it?" Ella asked me, and I shrugged.

"I've got foster parents, but I pretty much go where I want until I get caught and taken back." I admitted when Ella kept looking at me skeptically. "It's no big deal. I just don't understand why I have to belong to someone when I can clearly take care of myself."

"Max didn't know what she was getting into, did she?" Angel asked Ella with a smirk. "Lexi couldn't be a better carbon copy of the two of them. Her attitude and defiance towards authority, his undying love for a mate and silent mannerisms."

"Even without them around as an influence and she's still just like them?" Ella asked in disbelief and Angel just nodded. "So much for trying to let Alexis grow up normal..." Ella paused, glancing at me for a half second before asking in a whisper if she could see my wings.

I whipped them out, not really caring who saw them at this point since I had already shown four other bird people, my boyfriend, a talking dog, and my best friend. Besides, Ella had helped deliver me supposedly, so she knew that I had them.

"Wow they've gotten big." Ella admired, touching the tips of them gently. "And still just as beautiful as ever..." I could tell from her tone that she was partially jealous.

When she composed herself, she asked about our plans from here.

"We were actually on our way to find Fang." Angel said, watching Ella's reaction, and probably her thoughts too, with anticipation.

As was becoming her custom, Ella didn't disappoint. Her eyes bulged, her mouth dropped open, and her entire expression changed to one of shock. "You know where he's at?" She asked, and I knew that she was waiting for the tiniest bit of information to pass on to her sister.

"I know a general area." Angel said, glancing at her watch to see that only half an hour had past. "We really should be on our way soon though if we're going to have any chance of catching up to him." Angel half appologized.

"Are you sure you have to go? I'd like to get to know Alexis a little more now that you've found her." Ella said, looking at me hopefully.

I knew I would have plenty of time to catch up with my aunt once this was all settled, but for now finding my father was the most pressing matter so I made no reply.

Angel ignored the qustion too. "Give Max that letter, but hopefully we'll be back by then, and remember not to be a stranger yourself-Nudge misses you too." She said the last part sort of spitefully and I once again wondered how the whole family had gotten so estranged.

Angel and I took to the skies within minutes and I was glad to finally be back on track, though now a thousand more questions were ringing in my head about my parents.


	22. Waiting

Chapter Twenty-One: Waiting

It took us longer than expected to find Fang. On our first day, we covered a lot of ground but had to stop in Texas to sleep for the night. I offered to spring for a motel with the money I stole from Nudge's house since she was loaded, but Angel just laughed and said that we'd get better use of it for food than for a "comfy room." So it was decided and the next morning we got up early and abandoned our foreclosed house shelter.

We were about three miles away from Henderson when Angel had another vision of my father. We now knew where he would be tomorrow morning so we tracked down the few landmarks and determined that he was headed towards a forest in Kentucky.

We made it there at eight that night and set up camp with the supplies Angel was smart enough to bring. How she knew what to do was beyond me.

"I'm used to roughing it." Angel answered my thoughts with a shrug.

I raised an eyebrow. "I thought the Flock haven't been on the run for like ten years?"

"They haven't. I have." Angel replied as if it wasn't anything.

"But why would you _want_ to?" I asked, not sure how this was something she could do every day.

I was uncomfortable already with just knowing that we were going to be out in the open where anyone could attack us while we slept on the dirt floor. It was one thing to be a runaway and sneak into people's houses like I did, but this was something entirely different. I had a new respect for the Flock for having done this as long as they did.

"I didn't really have much of a choice." Angel said at long last. "My entire life, this was all I knew how to do. When we broke up, I tried to get a normal life like Nudge and Iggy managed to do, but it just wasn't me. I stayed with Ella and her mom until I was old enough to figure out that Max and Fang weren't coming back and everyone else had moved on. So Total and I did what we do best, we ran."

"But for sixteen years?" I asked, still in disbelief.

"If you must know, I was trying to track down other branches of the School, the evil place where we were created, but I only managed to find three of them over the years." Angel said with a huff. "Itex, the School in Nevada, and a new division called Global Warming Prevention, which ironically did the opposite of what the name said."

The conversation dropped after that, half because I wasn't sure if I wanted to ask about her solo missions and half because Angel didn't look like she wanted to tell me about them. We silently set to work on a fire since the light was fading and I collected sticks while Angel fiddled with my lighter.

When I returned back to the camp site, there was a strange girl sitting where Angel had once been.

A foriegn voice giggled, said "pretty good disguise, huh?," and I gasped.

"Angel?" I asked, startled at the redhead about my age with a faceful of freckles and green eyes.

"The one and only." Angel replied, still sounding like a teenager and not like the twenty-something she really was.

"You look...you look so_ different_." I said, trying to hide my surprise. I had seen her change her appearance once before, but this was a complete change. She looked like an entirely different person.

"Thanks." She said with a toothy grin. She extended her wings and instead of the usual white color, they were bright red. "It isn't too much?" Her new girlish voice asked and I shook my head.

"Fang would have recognized me and that would probably scare him off before you even got a chance to meet him." She explained, answering my thoughts again. "Now it's time for bed. They'll be here in the morning and we'll need our wits to deal with them."

"Them? I thought it was just my dad?" I asked, scrunching up my eyebrows.

"He's been gone for sixteen years trying to do his part and save the world," Angel said, "he had to have backup."

"So he made his own Flock?" I asked, not wanting to believe it. My image of the perfect Flock was slowly getting crumbled the more that I heard about their recent activities.

Angel nodded, a frown on her face, before she turned around on the ground and cuddled up in the fetal position to sleep for the night. I tried to sleep as well, but instead ended up wrestling in my mind over my feelings the entire night.

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**AN: Are you prepared for Lexi meeting Fang? :) Next chapter will be really long but I needed this one as a prelude to it so sorry about the shortness. **


	23. Flock 20

**AN: Today's my birthday, so you guys are in for a treat this chapter :)**

* * *

Chapter Twenty-Two: Flock 2.0

"Lexi," A girlish voice yell-whispered and I felt a gentle shove as someone tried to wake me up. "Lexi, you have to get up."

I opened my eyes, searching for Angel but was startled yet again when taking in her new appearance. I don't think I'll ever be able to get used to her physical appearance changing ability.

"Wah...?" I asked, not bothering to form a full word since it was so early in the morning. I could barely see the sun through the trees so it was mostly dark in the camp site.

"You have to get up right now, your snoring might scare off Fang's Flock before they even touch down." Redheaded Angel said with a serious tone that no longer matched her voice.

We proceeded to get the camp site ready for my father and his new friends' arrival, but after everything had been done, we sat and waited since that was all that was left to do. When Angel said that they were within fifty miles of us, she started giving me careful instructions about how to act and such.

"You have to remember not to call me Angel." She said sternly, though the delivery was lost with the presentation. "Fang will be tipped off right away and the last thing we want to do is scare him. I haven't seen him for sixteen years, but you have yet to ever see him so we want to not startle him right off the bat. We'll join his new Flock and then reveal ourselves when the time is right."

"What should I call you then? Ginger?" I said with a laugh as I tugged on a piece of her red hair teasingly. I was remembering that not even two days ago I had playfully called my boyfriend Taylor 'Ginger' because of his own red hair.

"Ginger it is." Angel replied with a shrug. "It doesn't really matter to me as long as you remember it."

"Do you...do you think that he'll like me?" I asked when the conversation died and my nerves started to get the better of me.

I was minutes away from meeting my father, the thing I've been waiting for my entire life, and I had no idea how to act. I usually wasn't a nervous person; usually, I would be laughing anything serious off and building up walls against the unknown, but this was my father we were talking about. My walls had long been torn down when it came to my emotions about findng my family.

Now that it was within reach, I was starting to doubt if this was a good idea or not. So what if I never knew? Hundreds of people never met their real parents and most of them turned out just fine, minus the serial killers and convicts of course.

"He'd be a fool not to like you." Angel, I mean Ginger, said at last. "Besides, you're too much like your mother for him to be able to resist liking you."

"You really think so?" I asked, but never got a reply because I got distracted by the sight of four large birds flying in our direction. Ginger and I hid behind massive trees, eerily quiet as not to get suspected.

"I don't care how much you argue, I'm not going to let you use your visions against us." A voice that sounded familiar, but older, said and I fought the urge to jump out from behind my tree to see the person face to face.

That voice had haunted my dreams and echoed in my ears since I was a litttle kid. I would know her voice anywhere. Could I really have gotten so lucky? Could my mother have found my father and joined his Flock?

"Maggie, leave the boy alone." A deep voice, also familiar yet older, said and I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stick up. "We have company."

"You can quit hiding behind the trees." That voice that I recognized as my father said almost irritated like. "I could smell you two a mile away."

Hesitantly, Angel and I stepped around the giant tree and came into view of the four bird people. Angel looked scared, but I couldn't tell if it was all part of her "teenage girl" persona or if she truly was afraid. Either way, I only looked at her for a moment before my attention drifted elsewhere.

My eyes instantly landed on the tall, black haired, dark eyed, olive skinned, black winged guy also known as Daddy. He had hardly changed over the years, or since Brain had gotten images of him and supplied them to me via brain attacks, and had the same poker face as I had practiced many a times in the mirror.

The woman on his right didn't quite match up with my image of my mother. Maximum Ride had been a brunette with sunhighlights, but this woman looked blonde with brown streaks. They eyes were both brown, but this woman's were more of a murky water brown than the rich chocolate color that Max had passed on to me. Her wings were brown instead of tan and I'm almost positive that this woman was left-handed by the way she stood.

My heart sunk a little bit as I compared the woman to my visions of my mother. This was definitely not her, though from a distance they could be twins.

Behind the two of them was a boy no more than ten and a girl who looked to be about fourteen. The guy resembled the woman who was not my mother, sharing her hair color and skin tone, though he had dark eyes. The girl had icy blue eyes, pale pale skin, and blonde almost white hair that was spiked like a pixie's.

"State your purpose." Fang tried not to growl at us.

"We were camping out here for the night and when we saw you from a distance, we got scared and hid." 'Ginger' said in a frightened tone. Yup, definitely an act. "We couldn't tell if you were good or one of Them..." She let out a fake shudder and I knew that she was refering to one of the institutions she had been destroying her whole life.

"Wings?" Fang asked, raising an eyebrow in our direction as he pulled in his own.

Angel extended hers to show the fake red color that she had created and I wiggled my shoulders to let part of one of mine be exposed. The new Flock took a good look before seeming to relax. I was surprised that Fang didn't make the connection right then and there, but if he suspected I was his daughter, he kept his mouth closed.

"I'm Ginger," Angel said with a contained smirk in my direction, "and this is Lexi."

"Maggie," the woman who resembled Maximum Ride stated, pointing at herself, "Kayla," she pointed at the blue eyed girl, "my son Ben," she pointed to the little boy, "and our leader, Alex." When she pointed at my father, I was shocked.

'Fake names?' I asked Angel, hoping she'd be listening to my thoughts.

'No, they seem to really want to be called these.' Angel thought back, her eyes still honed in on Fang. There was something she still wasn't telling me.

"Where are you headed?" Fang/Alex asked, still giving Angel a suspicious look as he held her gaze.

"Away from the School." I replied, going over what we rehearsed not even an hour ago. "That place should be burned to the ground." I added, loving the twitch of a smile on my father's face when I said that.

"If you wanna see it burned, then you'd better stick with us for a little while." Kayla said, gleam in her eyes. "Because where we're headed, there are about to be fireworks..."


	24. Distance

**AN: So a few of you guessed that Maggie is Max II, and you'd be correct. Sorry, I couldn't make it that easy for her to find_ both_ of her parents lol. But don't worry, Max will come into the story soon so keep up the reviews :) **

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Chapter Twenty-Three: Distance 

The day had passed by without incident and Angel, I mean Ginger, and I managed to blend in with Fang's Flock almost without resistant. Maggie looked at me with wonderous eyes and Fang, "Alex," barely looked at me at all.

I couldn't deny that I was hoping for more of a dramatic reunion with my father, but this was what I got so this was what I had to settle for. Angel seemed disappointed as well, but she had completely changed her entire persona so it wasn't crazy that he hadn't recognized her. Me, on the other hand, he had never met before and probably didn't know existed.

Ben, Maggie's son, wasn't much for words and mostly kept to himself. There was something off about him that I couldn't quite place, but since nothing seemed alarming, I just kept my distance a little and didn't worry too much about it. Angel, on the other hand, was having a field day in our minds and kept sending me 'red flags' about him without giving specifics.

Kayla was my favorite New Flock member. She was spunky and had sass and would probably have been invited to join my Crew if she lived in LA. She was definitely an individual worth knowing. She had such raw emotions and she wore them colorfully on her sleeves. Or rather, to be more acurate, she wore them in her eyes.

Her eyes, which had been icy blue when Angel and I joined this morning, were now forestry green. She explained that they changed with her emotions. When she was on her guard, they were blue; calm, green; angry, red; and so forth. She also hinted that if I ever saw them black, that I should run as far away as I could-no ifs, ands or buts.

I took her advice to heart and warned Angel as well. She seemed to be distancing herself from everyone in this Flock, even me, so I had to wonder what was going through her mind, or maybe who's mind she was going through that had her so distracted.

We flew for the rest of the day, stopping only once to eat and use the bathroom. Poor Ben looked like his blatter was about to explode near nightfall, but he never said a word. He was determined for a ten year old, so that made me wonder how the original Flock had faired as children.

Angel said a while ago that she had been only six when they started running and it wasn't until she was eleven that she found a temporary home at my grandmother's house. But at fourteen when Nudge and Iggy got married, she ran away and decided to follow in Max's footsteps and destroy Schools.

What shocked me the most was the fact that she said she had never come across Fang's Flock or my mother during her years on her own, especially since she's a pshycic. She had almost easily found Fang when I said I wanted to find him.

When I confronted her about it, she shrugged and said that she wasn't worried about finding them and that they could "take care of themselves." I could see that she was hurt that they hadn't ever come after her or the other Flock members, but she ended our conversation before I could ask anything else.

That was yesterday before we joined Fang's Flock; now I knew there was a zero percent chance that she'd answer my questons.

Near dusk, we settled for dumpster diving since they were saving their money for when they'd actually need it and Angel sent me a thought telling me not to let on that I had money. I didn't think twice about it since Angel had been doing this all her life and she was the mindreader, afterall.

Eating from the garbage was something that even as a kid growing up on the streets I never had to experience. It was startling to see how easily Ben dug in the dumpster or how satisfied Kayla looked when she found most of the remains of a salad. I had difficulty, but Angel helped pick out non-gross items and together we made sort of a picnic.

When we finally finished eating, Fang signalled for us to take flight and we followed behind him since he was set on not conversing with any of us.

"Is he always like this?" I asked, but Kayla just shrugged and Maggie looked like she was going to explain something, but bit her tongue instead.

We set up camp in sort of a swamp near the Kentucky border. Since the ground was too wet from a recent rain, we slept in the trees. Ben cuddled up near Maggie, Angel and I shared a tree with Kayla, and Fang had a tree all to himself a few feet away. He seemed dead set on not welcoming Angel and me into the Flock.

The entire night, while I tossed and turned (and tried not to fall off of the branch), I kept thinking about what I could have done to make my father already not like me.


	25. Maggie

Chapter Twenty-Four: Maggie

"You ready to go burn down your School?" Kayla asked me as soon as I woke up on my second day with the new Flock.

"Wha-?" I asked, blinking back the sunlight from my eyes.

"You snore really loudly." Ben spoke up, almost afraid that he might be heard by anyone, but I just nodded.

Fang and Maggie looked like they were annoyed by this fact, but I couldn't help that I snored. I didn't see why it upset either of them since they weren't even sleeping near me last night.

"Yeah, I know." I said, shrugging my shoulders and forcing the sleep from my body. "What can I say? I'm a noisy sleeper."

I wanted nothing more than to curl back against the tree that had been my bed for the night, but that wasn't a possibility now. Everyone else was already down below, except Kayla who was on the branch next to me. Sleeping in a tree was oddly peaceful, though that was probably the bird part of me.

Kayla rolled her eyes. "Anyways, are you ready to burn down the School you guys escaped from?" She asked again and I put two and two together finally.

Angel had claimed that we ran away from a School facility and the Flock had said yesterday that they were on their way to the same one and mentioned something about "fireworks."

"Um, yeah I guess I'm ready." I lied, not sure what answer was correct so I settled with mild contempt.

Was burning down a building something that the original Flock enjoyed? Should I be more excited? Should I not care at all? Judging from the look on Kayla's face, excitement and/or revenge was what was expected. Or, at least that's what her eye color reflected.

"Well, once we get there, you'll feel differently." Kayla promised, more to herself than to me though.

Before we blew up "my" School, I wanted to talk with my father so I dropped down to the marsh land, not bothering to extend my wings at such a short distance downwards. When I landed gracefully, I looked up at Kayla who had utter shock in her eyes. I stared at the tree and was surprised that she was two stories or so up. It had looked like a lot less when I jumped.

"What are you crazy!" Kayla asked, extending her wings and flying to where I was at. "That's suicidal, Lexi! You can't do a jump like that!"

"Weren't you scared?" Ben asked with wide eyes, reflecting the fear that he assumed I should have.

Apparently this batch of experiments was taught not to take risks. I, however, was not one of them. I was a second generation Avian who never set foot in a lab. I dared to be daring and difficult and different.

"No-pe." I said, popping the 'p' sound and defiantly put my hands on my hips to prove it. I ruffled my hair with one hand while keeping the same look on my face, as if to say, 'you thought that was impressive, just wait.'

Maggie gasped and Fang tried to hide his expression, but apparently whatever I did was enough to cause a reaction in both of them. Even Angel had difficulty hiding her surprise, but she recovered sooner than the other two.

"Where's my breakfast?" Ben whined without meaning to, looking at his mother hopefully but she just shook her head.

"Sorry, kid." Maggie said, ruffling his brown hair. "There's just not enough money for three meals a day anymore."

Ben sat down in defeat, glaring at 'Ginger' and me. He had every right to, if we had in fact used any money since we'd arrived, but as it was, we dumpster dived for our meal yesterday.

We took off soon after that, since there was no food to be had or luggage to pack. I noticed that everyone had a backpack, but no one had opened theirs to change outfits so I didn't either. Whatever they needed clean outfits for must be good and I wasn't going to miss out on it.

I flew towards the back today, observing instead of trying desperately to participate. Angel chatted politely with Kayla, Ben flew in the middle all by himself, and Maggie seemed to be trying to talk to Fang. He let out a word or two in response to her paragraphs and eventually she quit trying.

She flew back to the rear with me and tried talking to me instead.

"So..." She began, obviously having something on her mind.

"Yes?" I asked impatiently.

She dropped her voice low so the three in front of us couldn't hear and whispered, "you aren't really from that School, are you?"

"What?" I asked, faking defense. "I'm an experiment, just like you." I lied through my teeth. "I was raised at the School and escaped with Ginger not too long ago. The scientists were evil and the other creatures were sometimes worse."

"Then you knew that my son was part Eraser?" She asked, trying to trap me since I had no idea what an eraser was, other than the thing on the end of a pencil, and I was pretty sure she wasn't talking about that.

I shrugged, trying to play it diplomatically and BS my way through this conversation. "I didn't really care what he was mixed with."

"Who are you?" She asked with a scowl. "Anyone who actually participated in one of the School's experiments is terrified of Erasers. That's why your friend is so jumpy and won't come within two feet of Ben."

"I told you. My name is Lexi, I grew up in the School, I..." I said, but Maggie cut me off.

"Save it." She said angrily. "I don't know why you want to infiltrate our Flock, but I won't let you succeed in whatever mission you have planned. It took me too long to convince Alex to let me and Ben join this group and you are not about to take that away from us."

"I wasn't trying to..." I started, but my words got caught in my throat. What was I supposed to say to her without giving away who I was?

"I don't want to split up the Flock." I said, hoping I looked as sincere as I meant it to be. "Ginger and I just want to destroy our School."

"The threat remains all the same." Maggie said, her brown eyes piercing mine. "Whatever angle you have, save it."


	26. Explosions

**AN: Soooo sorry for the lack of updates lately. I'm so swamped with end of the year school stuff but I get out in a few weeks and then it will be a chapter a day, at least. As always, review :) **

Chapter Twenty-Five: Explosions

After my conversation with Maggie, I was more on guard.

She had somehow noticed that I wasn't an actual experiment like the rest of them, though my DNA was that of one from there. The woman who looked so much like my mother hated me and that made me nervous to actually meet my real mother. Would she hate me just as much or was this woman suspious of me _because_ of my mother.

We flew to the School that Angel and I were claiming as "our own" in silence.

Some were preparing for battle, Kayla looked like she was about to explode with happiness at getting to destroy something, and Fang/Alex/Dad was staring off into space, not hearing a word Maggie was saying to him. Every few seconds, he would turn around and glance at his Flock and I like to think that he was checking to make sure I was still there, but that was me being vain.

The actual destruction of the School was nothing special, or at least it didn't seem like it to me. What happened leading up to that, however, will take a little explaining...

We ran through the building first to make sure that there weren't any experiments inside.

Since we were considered "home visitors," Kayla asked for a rundown on the blueprints of the place. Somehow Angel was able to hack into the system, or maybe she read a worker's mind, because she accurately gave everyone the layout of "our" School prior to attack time. Once again her mind reading powers saved our butts.

We split up-Ben and Maggie headed to the North Hall, Kayla went West, Fang took the East Hall, and Angel and I were in charge of the South entrance. We were told to set any experiment free, knocking out any scientists in the way, and told to meet back up in ten minutes.

This seems easy enough but since there were guards everywhere and giant wolfmen at almost every entrance, it was more difficult that I expected. Angel, however, was planned. She snuck through hallway after hallway until she was in front of one of the rooms labeled 'testing.'

"There's a little boy in here." Angel whispered, her fake red hair and green eyes still managing to startle me. "You go get him and I'll keep watch."

"Keep watch for who...?" I asked, but she just waved me on. I had a feeling it was those scary wolf creatures that we had passed on the way here, so I shut my mouth. I'd rather get some random little experiment kid than fight one of those awful wolves.

That wasn't an Eraser, was it? I couldn't be sure, since Ben didn't look like a wolf at all and Maggie had claimed he was half-Eraser. If that was the case though, I could see why Angel was keeping her distance; as tough as I was, I couldn't help the shudder that ran down my spine when I spotted one of them in the hallway.

I cleared my mind and focused on finding the little boy that 'Ginger' said was in here. From what I saw, there wasn't a soul in this place; an empty cage, a knocked over lab stool, a window at the far end with bars blocking pretty much all of the possible sunshine...but no experiment.

"Hello...?" I called out, not too loudly as to be heard by one of those wolf things but just loud enough to be heard by the little boy if he happened to really be in here.

A small "who are you?" was said and I searched the room again for the voice.

"I can't see you." I said, trying not to lose my temper. "I'm here to help. We're busting you out. My name is Lexi, what's yours?"

"Name?" The voice said again, and I saw slight movement in the cage.

I leaned closer and sure enough, there was the little boy, curled up in the corner of the metal cage. When I say "little boy," I mean it. He was no bigger than my palm and was shaking uncontrollably, though he seemed to have motor functions.

I pulled at the bars with my super strength, glad that it was one of the cheaper cages made with a ton of tiny bars to keep the boy trapped inside instead of big, thick metal bars. I picked him up as gently as I could, trying not to crush him in my hand as I took us to the door.

"Name?" He repeated, his wide blue eyes looking up at me. I wasn't sure what he was mixed with, but whatever it was, the animal was tiny. My guess was mouse or something, but I can't be entirely sure.

"Yeah, a name. Like, what do they call you?" I asked, signalling for Angel to come out of her hiding spot so we could continue down the hallway. We were close to deadline time, but there were so many rooms left to check.

"12-5-15." The small mouse like boy said, blinking his giant eyes at me and 'Ginger.'

"Leo." Angel said with a smile. "I like it."

_Any others soon?_ I asked in my mind, trying to be quiet.

_Next left. Two girls. I'm going to get them really quickly while you take Leo outside with the others. _Angel responded back.

_I'm perfectly capable of doing it myself. _I argued, not wanting to feel useless. _Why don't _you_ take Leo and_ I'll_grab the girls. It isn't safe for you to be here this close to the bomb going off. With my speed, I'll be out before you could even open the door. _

_I don't think that's a good ide-. _She started, but stopped when she saw the determined look on my face. _That's exactly what Max would have done, you know. She cared more about the Flock than her own well being. _

That made me smile, but only for a second.

I handed Leo over to Angel and rushed down the hall while she took off in the other direction. I had only a few minutes left and there was no way that I'd let two innocent children die because of me.

The room was unlocked luckily, and the girls were both normal size so it didn't take any time to spot them. They were chained to the wall with heavy metal chains on opposite ends of the room so as not to have actual contact with the other I guess. I had one girl unlatched and she was helping me with the other girl when I started to panick that there wasn't much time left.

It was bad enough that they had to go through something as awful as this, let alone to die here too.

Ironically, that was my last thought before the explosion went off.


	27. Aftermath

_Previously on FLY ON: _

_It was bad enough that they had to go through something as awful as this, let alone to die here too._

_Ironically, that was my last thought before the explosion went off._

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Chapter Twenty-Six: Aftermath

I started coughing and gasping for breath almost immideately.

I'd like to say that it was from the fallen ceiling or dust from the explosion.

No, the thing cutting off my air supply wasn't either of those, though it took me awhile to realize what the weight was due to the lack of oxygen. I used all of my concentration to focus on what was on top of me...it was one of the girls that I had been in the process of rescuing when the bomb went off.

I slowly pushed her off of me, gently laying her next to me while I gasped for breath still. This girl was not like a normal hybrid experiment, she was heavy. All of the ones that I had ever met were light and had thin bones. Though the girl wasn't big, she definately weighed more than Angel and I combined and she was only eleven or so.

I looked at the other girl. Blondie was shuddering, her light green eyes staring at the brunette next to me with panic.

Now I stared at her too. She had muddy brown hair, a dirty tan face, and the same green eyes...only hers were staring straight upwards in a blank expression that reminded me a little bit of Iggy's, though I knew this girl wasn't blind.

"She's dead, isn't she?" The blonde asked and I paused a second to consider it. I couldn't hear her breathing, but that didn't mean much since I was a little bit in shock still. "My sister is dead." She stated when I didn't say anything.

I reached over and checked the brunette's pulse. When I didn't find one, I nodded.

The blonde nodded too, though more to herself than to me, and wiped a single tear from her cheek. "It's better this way." She said at long last. "Her date kicked in two days ago...so it's better that she won't die with the whitecoats. Maria thought we were getting out of here, she thought that I was going to take care of her...it's better that she never knew that I couldn't." The thirteen year old said, holding back a sob.

"We're going to get out of here." I promised, glancing at her sister with a frown. I didn't know how we'd be able to get out of the broken building with her in tow too.

_You have a minute to get out of there before the second bomb goes off. Hurry, Lexi._ Angel's voice sounded in my head, startling me back to the mission at hand. If the building was still intact enough for us to move around, then that meant the same for the scientists and wolfmen.

"Okay, we have to go. Now." I told the blonde girl who's name I still didn't know. I pulled at her remaining chain and pushed her towards the door. I picked up Maria and slung her over my shoulder as delicately as I could, trying to have some respect for the dead and all but also knowing that time wasn't on our sides.

We made it out of the building and were in the yard running for our lives when the second, most destructive bomb went off. I pulled Blondie close to me to try and protect her from the impact, but we still went sailing from the sheer force of the explosion.

This time when I started coughing it really was from the impact. The dust engulfed my lungs and I fought back tears as I struggled to breath once again. Blondie seemed to be fairing alright, and was simply staring at me as she breathed normally.

"I have special lungs." She explained when I finally stopped convulsing. "I'm part whale, well, me and my sister both." She said and it made sense all of a sudden. Maria weighed enough to be one. It seemed like Blondie got all of the good genes from the DNA fuse and her poor little sister didn't get any.

"I'm part falcon, I guess." I said, not quite sure what my parents gave me; I did research long ago and figured out that the black colored part of my wings that sometimes tinted purple were similar to falcons' wings.

"That's really cool." Blondie said, glancing at her sister with a frown before looking back at me. "I'm Anna, by the way...and you are...?"

"Lexi." I responded, helping Anna up and putting Maria back over my shoulder. We needed to find Fang's Gang so we could bury her sister away from the School. But right now I wasn't sure if it was safe or not, and the more distance we could put between us, the better.

I spotted Angel's bright red hair a mile away, literally, and headed off in that direction. Anna followed behind silently, no doubt wondering what I was doing with her sister.

Angel read my mind and knew what was happening before I got within twenty feet of the group. They looked bent out of shape, though none had as many bruises or cuts as I did, and all turned to stare at us when we approached.

"Now that we're all here, let's get out of here." Fang said, eying me warily. He came over and, without another word, took Maria from me.

He held her gently in his arms, like he was cradling a baby, and took off into the air.

We all followed behind him, some on foot and the rest in the air. Leo was in Angel's arms, tucked closely to her body to keep the wind out of his face as she flew. Anna was riding on some strange guy's back who seemed to be part cheatah or something. Another jungle cat type girl was close behind them, matching his pace. A young boy was in the back of our group; whatever animal he was mixed with was relatively slow, though fast enough to not get too far behind.

When it was close to sundown and our running friends seemed to be wearing out, Fang gracefully descended. There was a small opening in the mouth of a cave that he seemed to narrow in on for a second before remembering we had experiments that couldn't climb that high. We camped instead on the ground beneath a few big oak trees.

We got to know the experiments while Ben and Fang were helping dig a pit, or a makeshift grave, for Maria. They were the only two with enough brute force to do any heavy lifting, and since the others had been in cages until now, they had little strength other than the little used to fight off Erasers (though from what they said, the wolfmen had long ago just become guards instead of fighters).

Cheatah boy was nineteen, the oldest of the experiments at that particular School, and named Tom.

His big cat female was named, ironically, Cat, though it was short for Catarina. She was part leapord and has a memory that goes back about fifteen years, though Angel thinks she's at least two years older than that.

The youngest runner was a ten year old guy by the name of Dave. He was part deer, though he was considered a failure because he didn't inherit the speed gene like expected.

"It's done." Fang spoke up, startling Cat who had been in the middle of a story about one of her tests.

We all crowded around the grave sight and stared down at the young girl's body. She looked so fragile in the dirt like that, so innocent and sweet. It hurt my heart to see someone like that go, though I didn't know her personally. Any kid that had to die at a horrible place like that had to have deserved better. I cursed myself for not being able to save her. If I had only gotten there sooner...

_Don't beat yourself up. It doesn't do any of us any good. _Angel's caring voice said in my head, trying to reassure me. _Her date kicked in so she would have been dead within a day anyways. Her sister admires you for what you did..._

That startled me and I almost voiced my doubt when Anna spoke up.

"I'll never forget what you did for us." Anna said, and I knew from the look in her eyes that it was true and she would indeed remember this day for the rest of her life.


	28. Shocked

**AN: Sorry for the mix-up. Anna is part whale, though in the last sentence I hinted that she was an elephant. And for those of you who didn't notice, excuse that-I went back and changed it.**

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Chapter Twenty-Seven: Shocked

Our new group didn't stay together long, despite all that we went through in the last twenty-four hours.

As soon as Maria was buried and we had all rested up, Tom the cheatah announced that he was heading off on his own. Naturally, his mate Cat wanted to follow and even Dave seemed to want to join. Dave and Leo were friends of sorts, or as much as two young boys who just met could be, so he wanted to go as well. Leo was small due to his mouse DNA so it was easy for him to get carried.

That just left Anna with our group. She, for a split second, decided to go with them, but then she kept saying that we saved her and she owed us. So, in the end, she stayed.

It was hard explaining to Fang's Flock that 'Ginger' and I didn't know any of the experiments from 'our' School, but Angel was able to lie our way out of it once again. I was going to forever be grateful to the youngest member of my parents' Flock.

Speaking of my parents, I still had yet to have an actual conversation with my father.

I was just too nervous to bring it up and too panicked not to. My mind was in a jumble of mixed emotions.

On the one hand, I was dying to get to know my father, and on the other hand, I was terrified that he wouldn't like me. I had waited sixteen years to meet this man and tell him all about my life but now that I was feet away from him, I couldn't think of anything to say.

But today I was determined to change that. We had been with this Flock for three days now and I had somewhat gotten enough courage to talk to him.

"Try not to spill everything." Angel said with a giggle, tossing her disguised red hair over her shoulder. "We've only been here a few days."

"Haha." I replied back, trying to hold back a glare.

Angel went to help Kayla and Anna gather firewood while Ben was angrily kicking rocks somewhere in the forest. He was upset because yet another girl had joined our group, and one that was afraid of him too.

Fang and Maggie were whispering quietly over on the other side of the clearing, though it seemed more like she was arguing and he was just sitting there and taking it.

I stood back, trying to listen in without letting them know that I was eavesdropping, but it wasn't exactly working. Their conversation was getting more heated, but I still couldn't hear anything.

After about five minutes, Fang stormed off angrily. By "stormed off," I mean that he jumped into the air and took off into the morning sky. I watched his pure black wings against the sun until it was too far away to follow.

"Now what am I supposed to do?" I asked myself, trying not to become a wreck. The little bit of confidence I had left was quickly fading away.

"I hope you're happy." A voice said, startling me out of my skin and making me recoil on the balls of my feet in a defensive reflex.

"What?" I asked Maggie, the intruder who invaded my mumbling.

"You got what you wanted." Maggie said angrily, her brown eyes piercing mine. "You and Ginger get to stay."

"Wait, you tried to get us kicked out?" I asked in disbelief. Something about this woman was unsettling.

"Don't worry," Maggie said with an eye roll similar to my signature move, "Alex wouldn't let that happen. For some reason, he seems to have taken interest in you guys."

"Um...thanks?" I said, not willing to let her get to me anymore than she already was.

She had no rebutle for that, so she walked away in the least dramatic way I've ever seen.

Since I had been pumping myself up to talk to my father, now that he had gone AWOL I didn't particularly feel like joining the rest of the Flock so I decided to stretch my wings out. They were stiff from not being used yet this morning. Usually I would fly in the middle of the night back home, but being around my father and other people like me had calmed down my night flights.

I flew straight upwards, letting the adrinaline fuel my superspeed.

Before I knew it, I was getting close to my breaking point so I closed my eyes and let myself fall downwards with the gravitational pull. It was like intense freefalling or bungee jumping on crack. I always relished at the feeling, and felt sometimes that it always ended too soon.

When I could hear animals around me, I opened my eyes and slowed my descent. At the last second, I pulled in my wings and skidded to a halt on the gravel of the cave's mouth.

I had this instinctive pull to go to the cave instead of the campsite a hundred feet below and it wasn't until my eyes were adjusting to the light that I figured out what it was.

I was standing directly in the morning sunlight, so that's probably why he got confused, but as soon as I felt my feet hit the ground, I heard a startled voice called out, "Max..."


	29. Blabber Mouth

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Blabber Mouth

I was standing directly in the morning sunlight, so that's probably why he got confused, but as soon as I felt my feet hit the ground, I heard a startled voice call out, "Max..."

My voice got lost in my throat like a Twix bar when you just need a moment, only I needed about ten Twix bars because I had no idea what to say. Apparently, neither did my father. We stood in awkward silence for a minute or two before he cleared his throat; I guess he had just eaten a Twix too.

"Oh, sorry, Lexi..." Fang said nervously at long last, running his hand through his dark black hair and refusing to meet my eyes, "I...I thought you were someone else."

"Tell me about her." I said desperately, not even remembering telling my brain to say the words out loud. But they were out there now and I _had_ to know now. "Tell me about Max."

He flinched when I said her name, as if it were a curse word or like lime squirted on a wound that hadn't been healed. He looked away, a far off look in his eyes, and I almost thought that he was ignoring my request but when he looked back at me, he seemed to have made up his mind. He gestured towards the ground for us to sit on.

"This is a long story," he explained as I took the seat next to him. "It's not one that I've ever told, though Maggie knows bits and pieces...but there's just something about you that reminds me of Max..." He drifted off, leaving the sentence hung in the air like that.

I wanted to blurt out that I was his daughter and Max was my mom, but I knew that now wasn't the time. If I wanted to find out exactly what happened between them, I had to be patient.

"Anyways," he said, shaking off a memory in his head, "don't say I didn't warn you. This story doesn't have a happy beginning or a happy end, so brace yourself."

I nodded, not sure that I really wanted to know anymore, but dying of curiousity anyways.

"Maximum Ride, that's her name, by the way," Fang said, a small smile twitching his lips, "was created at the same School as I was. Not just us though, there were four others that made up our Flock, the original Flock. We were tested on, beaten, starved, and sometimes forced to kill other experiments for our survival-though you probably had similar experiences at your own School."

I didn't correct him, but he didn't seem to be talking to me anymore anyways. His thoughts were a million miles away as he continued the story.

"Max was the leader of our Flock, and she loved every minute of it. We destroyed our School when she and I were fourteen, and that was when I fell in love with her." Another small smile. "She wanted them to pay for what they'd done to us, her family, and she was just so beautiful doing it that I couldn't help but notice the change that had been occuring within her."

I would have thrown in a "eww, gross" because he was talking about my mom like that, but it was such a sweet story that his teenage boy memories couldn't ruin it.

"She didn't feel the same until we were fifteen, though I knew that I would wait for her forever so it didn't really matter that a year had passed." Fang said, "Our love was strong, though apparently not enough. She had a world to save and I was just along for the ride. She took off one day without a word to anyone and naturally I went off in search of her...only I got captured."

"By whom?" I asked, panic in my voice though he was clearly fine right now so nothing completely horrible could have happened.

"Itex, another form of the School. There are hundreds of branches of both around the world...but that's not really important." Fang said, sighing as he tried to get back on track. "Anyways, they erased my memory and trained me as one of their guards. Since I couldn't remember anything other than that life, I stayed and obeyed; but at night, I would dream of her..."

"Awww." I said before I had a chance to stop the reflex.

Fang looked embarrassed, though his olive skin didn't darken but slightly. "The problem was, I couldn't remember her. I couldn't remember Max."

"But you do now...?" I asked, though it was redundant since he was telling a story about their lives.

"I do, but only because of Maggie." Fang said, trying not to glare off into space as he thought about her. "I guess I should mention that Maggie's name when I first met her was Max II."

I raised an eyebrow, not following where this was going.

"Maggie is Maximum Ride's clone." He stated and suddenly it all made sense. She looked so much like the images I got from Brain about my mother, but I knew when I first met her that she wasn't Max. "She informed me that it had been fourteen years since I was abducted. Ben was eight at the time and a little uncontrollable due to his Eraser genes, but Maggie couldn't abandon him..."

"Did you go looking for her, Max I mean?" I asked, not willing to believe that my father would ever give up looking for my mother.

"I did." He said, an angry/sad expression on his face. "But her sister said she had passed away, along with one of my other Flock members. I didn't believe that it could be true until I saw the two graves in the yard...so Maggie and I struck out on our own, with Ben of course. That was two years ago. Kayla joined us seven months ago and we've been a group ever since."

I couldn't believe it. Ella had lied to my father? Why would she do that...unless she was protecting Max? I felt like I was going to get sick.

"She lied." I whispered, once again not being able to stop the words. "Ella lied, Max isn't dead." I whispered when Fang stared at me strangely.

"How did you know her name was Ella?" He asked, emotions strong on his face. "Maggie was right-you are here to destroy us." He grabbed me by the shoulders forcefully. "Who_ sent_ you?" He asked angrily and I tried not to break down.

"No one, Fang." I said, but that was the wrong word choice again.

"I told you my name was Alex." He said angrily, his dark eyes darkening the angrier he got. "I haven't been called Fang in a _long_ time. I'm only going to ask one more time: Who sent you?"

"I did." I finally admitted, knowing that Angel was going to kill me.

"Why? You obviously know my past, so why did you come if not to spy on us?" He asked, still angry but less tense now.

I took a deep breath, knowing I would probably need it, and said my next words as nonchalant as I could. "I figured that my dad might like to meet me since he didn't even know I existed until now..."

* * *

**AN: Sorry for another cliffhanger, but the next chapter needs to start here so Lexi can tell her story now that Fang's told his. **


	30. 20 Questions and Counting

Chapter Twenty-Nine: Twenty Questions and Counting 

I took a deep breath, knowing I would probably need it, and said my next words as nonchalant as I could. "I figured that my dad might like to meet me since he didn't even know I existed until now..."

"Your what?" Fang asked, barely blinking as he took in my words.

"My father..." I said, running my hand through my hair nervously. "Fang, you're my dad."

"It...it's not possible." Fang denied my existance. "I never had any children."

"That you knew of..." I responded back. I had been so afraid that he wouldn't like me that I never bothered to think about the fact that he might not believe me. I wasn't sure how to prove my identity, so this might be difficult.

"How could I not know about my daughter?" He asked in disbelief. "I would have known, wouldn't I?"

Instead of letting me answer, he kept asking more rehtorical questions quietly to himself. It was almost as if I wasn't even there. "The School? But how? I mean, they had an Eraser rape Maggie, but they wouldn't steal my sperm while I had my memory swiped, would they? Of course they would. Who am I kidding? But why...?"

"Um, the School didn't have anything to do with me." I stated, catching his rant in the middle before he could get too far. "I've never even been to a School until yesterday when we destroyed that one."

"Wait, Ginger said you guys grew up there." Fang said. Clearly my father wasn't a fast thinker.

"Yeah...about her..." I said, not sure how I was supposed to out Angel without her getting mad.

She had warned me that Fang didn't come back for the Flock and he wanted nothing to do with them...but from what he told me about his memory getting erased for the last decade, I think that he would have if he could have. Would she be able to forgive me? Well, too late now.

"Oh god, it's Angel, isn't it?" He asked, correctly guessing what I couldn't say. When I nodded, he continued. "I knew that she could change her form, but she had only been able to turn into animals the last time I saw her."

"Well she can change to different people now." I said with a smile, proud that he was excepting Angel so well. Now if only he would do the same for me...

"So, you're really my daughter?" Fang asked and I nodded. "And you weren't from a School?" He asked to confirm and, once again, I nodded. "Then where did you come from? How can this be possible?"

"I don't know a lot about biology, but I know enough to know where babies come from." I said, rolling my eyes slightly without meaning to.

He still seemed confused, so I decided to just come out and say it. I had to spill every bean that I had in order to make my father understand.

"I'm sixteen..." I said, hoping he'd go back and do the math to see that Max was my mother. I didn't know anything about my parents' sex life-nevermind, I don't even want to finish that sentence.

Fang still didn't seem to be getting it. I had to tell him something that would set him on the right track. What would make the difference?

From what Angel's told me, Fang always loved my name and even tried to convince Max to go by it at her high school. Maybe that was it. Maybe then he'd finally understand.

"The truth is, I lied about my name when I first arrived. Well, technically I didn't, but I think that my real name, the one my mother gave me, might be important to you, _Alex_." I said, finally getting why he wanted to be called that. "My name is Alexis."

"Alexis?" Fang asked, a grin splitting his entire face. "Alexis! You know what this means?" Another striking grin and a tiny laugh. "Oh, god, Max."

"I knew you'd figure it out." I said, giving him a grin of my own.

"You have her smile, you know." Fang said, frowning sadly.

"I know, and her eyes." I added. "The Flock told me."

"You met them?" Fang asked. "How are they doing? Did Iggy ever tell Nudge about her crush? When did you meet them? You said you hadn't met Max, so what happened? Did she leave you with them? Where'd she go? How do you know she's even alive?"

"Well, you're just full of questions, aren't you?" I teased. "What happened to the quiet guy from my visions?"

"Visions?" Fang asked, choking back. "You're a psycic?"

"Well, not exactly." I said, not sure how to explain this. "Brain tells me things and shows me pictures and videos of the Flock's past." I bet I sounded crazy.

"You have a Voice like Max too?" Fang asked.

"Actually, from what he tells me, I think he _is_ the Voice that she had." I stated. "I can also turn myself invisible, fly at superspeed, and hide my wings completely."

"You really are something special, aren't you?" Fang said, smiling proudly. "And to think, you're _my_ daughter."

That moment right then, that was probably the best moment of my life.

I had so much more to tell my dad, but, like the rest of my life, nothing seemed to be working in my favor.


	31. Jealousy is an Ugly Thing

_"You really are something special, aren't you?" Fang said, smiling proudly. "And to think, you're my daughter."_

_That moment right then, that was probably the best moment of my life._

_I had so much more to tell my dad, but, like the rest of my life, nothing seemed to be working in my favor._

* * *

Chapter Thirty: Jealousy is an Ugly Thing

"She's your _what_?" A voice asked behind us, completely in shock and more than a little bit angry at the statement. "Alex, please tell me I heard you incorrectly because otherwise I'll have to get my hearing checked."

I turned around when Fang did, though we both recognized the voice. Maggie was standing at the mouth of the cave, her tanish wings out slightly behind her as the setting sun hit her features.

"You heard right. She's my daughter." Fang said happily. "Maggie, you won't believe it if I told you."

"I highly doubt it is that complicated. Judging from the eyes and that smug little smile, I half figured it out the moment the two of them arrived...

"Really?" Fang asked in disbelief, not willing to believe that Maggie figured out I was his daughter before he did.

I guess it's a guy pride thing because I wasn't shocked that it took me explaining it to him for him to know. I expected as much from what the rest of the Flock told me about how much Fang really knew about why Max took off-he didn't even know she was pregnant.

Maggie nodded, "Unless, of course, the School that took your memory and held me captive also took something else from you too...kinda like how I ended up with a son with an Eraser." She left the sentence hanging but both of us knew what she was talking about.

"Um, yeah, well, I don't think that that...not to say that it couldn't be...but..." Fang stuttered, his olive cheeks slightly tinted pink in embarrassment at the thought of the School actually creating a lab baby between the love of his life's clone and himself.

My mom's clone just rolled her eyes. "Let me guess, you believe her 'mom' is the precious Maximum Ride?"

"Don't talk about her like that." Fang said, trying not to growl but failing a little bit. A small growl escaped his lips and his fists automatically clenched together defensively.

Maggie just waved off the comment with a shrug, clearly either thinking that he wouldn't actually attack or having enough faith in her own abilities to think she could handle him if he did attack.

"You know I mean no harm by it." She said, though her words don't line up with her tone.

She eyed me up and down, clearly trusting me less than before, before motioning to Fang that they had to talk about "this"-i.e. me.

They moved to the other side of the cave, Fang looking back every ten seconds to see that I hadn't left. Like I would even think about it. I had just gotten my dad, I wasn't going to let my mom's clone scare me off now.

"Really Fang, that's just _too_ simple." Maggie said, trying to keep her voice down so as not to let me hear their conversation. Too bad I have super hearing along with my super speed. "How do you know that she's not lying to gain your trust and lead us into a trap?"

"Everything she told me sounds right. I don't think she's lying, Maggie. At least not about being my daughter." Fang said, chancing a glance at me, but I pretended to be staring off into space and not eavesdropping.

"Doesn't this seem a little too coincidential?" Maggie quietly yelled. "I mean, until we ran into them, we hadn't even _heard_ about the original Flock's wereabouts. Now all of a sudden a daughter you didn't know existed shows up and wants you to go off in search of the leader?"

"Will you quit being so pessimistic?" Fang whisper-yelled back.

"I'm not being _pessimistic_." Maggie almost growled. "I'm having your back and trying to protect _our_ Flock since you obviously are too distracted."

"Usually your guardedness is helpful, but I know that Lexi is my daughter." Fang said as the final say in the matter.

"Fine, don't listen to me." Maggie said with a huff. "Don't say I didn't warn you though."

With that, she turned on her heel and went back down to our campsite where the others were at.

"Well, that was interesting." I said, letting out a low whistle. "Is she always this intense?" I asked, wanting to know if I should expect my mother to be like this or if this was just the 'evil clone' personality.

Fang let out a sigh, meeting my gaze briefly as his cheeks blushed for the second time in the last hour. "Only when she's jealous."


	32. Back to the Mission

Chapter Thirty-One: Back to the Mission

"Lexi, we have to go...now." Angel said later that night. I had yet to tell her about how my talk with my father had gone since as soon as Maggie took off, I decided to go for a fly with Fang to relieve some of the stress that was just created.

"What? Why?" I asked in disbelief, not wanting to have to leave my father even for a minute.

"Maggie knows." Angel said ominously, her fake green eyes meeting mine as if to prove a point. "Didn't you hear me, Lexi? She _knows_."

"About that..." I started but she was still talking so I let her finish and get it all out.

"She knows about all of it." 'Ginger' said in a panic. "She knows that I'm from the original Flock, she knows that we didn't grow up at that School we just blew up...and she knows who you are."

"Listen, Ginger," I said as Ben walked past us, when he was out of earshot, I continued. "I know she knows." I stated and her mouth dropped open.

"Whaaat? You knew? Hooow?" Angel asked in astonishment.

"Because I told Fa-Alex." I said, remembering his fake name just as Kayla walked near us with a bundle of firewood. I smiled at her and she tried to wave back but her hands were really full so she ended up having to stoop down and pick a few of them that she dropped.

But Angel wasn't distracted by it like I was. Instead she remained calm until Kayla was out of sight, then she pounced.

"Well? How did he take it? Did he believe you? Come on, Lex, I'm dying here." Angel practically begged, desperate for information in a way I never thought possible.

"Does he know about me too...?" She asked the last one hesitantly, her cheeks embarrassed at wanting to be accepted by a former Flock member, though I wasn't sure why she was embarrassed since that was the natural reaction.

"Of course I do, Angel." A voice said behind her and I smiled as a huge grin lit up 'Ginger's face. She spun around, her fake red hair whipping her in the face as she wrapped her arms around my dad.

"I missed you, Fang." She whispered, his head resting on top of her hair.

"I missed you too, Ange." Fang said with a small grin of his own. "Last time I saw you, you were ten. Now, why don't you change back so I can see how much you've really grown." He winked at her and she let out a little giggle.

And, with eyes closed for a second or two, Angel was back to Angel. Her fake red hair was now back to the natural blonde curls that Brain has shown me a thousand times, her pretend green eyes were back to the naturally beautiful blue color that reminded me of a skyline, and her freckles disappeared completely from her ten years younger face.

"Wow, Angel, you've really grown into a young woman." Fang said, taking a step back to admire his younger Flock sister.

Angel just blushed like a little kid, despite being twenty-three now. "Thanks, Fang."

"Why didn't you just bring the whole freakin' Flock?" Maggie asked in disbelief when she saw Angel as Angel right before her eyes. But her glare was aimed at me, not the mindreader.

"That's the plan." I teased, though from the look on her face she was anything but teasing. She meant business. "We already saw Nudge and Iggy, oh, and Krystal..."

"Krystal?" My father asked, not sure who she was since he had never met her.

"Their daughter." Angel replied with a grin. "You're an uncle, F-Nick." She teased, though I had no idea where "Nick" came from since he was known as "Alex" here.

"Well, let's not stand here, let's go!" Fang said, breaking into a grin that I didn't think possible, especially from what Brain had told me. "I want to meet my niece."

While he talked, Maggie seemed to be curling inside of herself, though her glare continued to bore down at me. At least I knew why.

I was taking away the one thing that had made her feel normal. But I couldn't help that; he was _my_ father, _my_ family-not _hers_. Because I knew when the time came, he would pick Angel and me over his new Flock any day...or at least I hoped anyways.

"Krystal and the others will have to wait." Angel said with determination. "We have someone more important to go find now. The time slot of my vision is closing and if we don't leave now, we'll never be able to find her."

"We're going after Max?" Though it was meant as a question, it came out more like a statement, like he knew all along that this was what we had planned from the beginning, which we did-he just didn't know about it. I loved how he said "we" though instead of "you guys."

"You can't just leave this Flock." Maggie burst in, finally having enough of just watching our conversation and letting it slip out of her control. "You owe us. If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't even know about any of this, you would still be at that School."

"So would you." Fang stated lightly. "You needed me much more than I ever needed you, though I am grateful that you helped me out. I have to do this though, Mags, you know that. If Ella hadn't lied to me all those years ago, I would still be out searching for Max. But now that I know she's not dead, I _have_ to go."

My heart swelled with pride. He really did it, he chose us.

"But..." He continued and my heart sank a little bit. I knew where this was going.

"Don't you dare invite us along for your little quest." Maggie interrupted before he had a chance to ask her. "We don't need your pity and we certainly don't need to be forced to follow _her_ around once we find her. We'll be fine," She said angrily, "not that you'd care."

"Maggie, it's not like that..." Fang tried to explain, but Angel put a hand on his shoulder to stop him when my mother's clone took off back to the campsite where the others were waiting.

"Let her go." Angel said calmly. "It's the right thing, not to mention, the only way that we'll be able to succeed in our mission."

"You're right." Fang said sadly, glancing back at the new family he had created. "Let me say goodbye to the others and grab my bag, you guys have everything?"

We nodded and in a few minutes he had returned with his backpack.

"U and A." Angel said with a wink towards Fang and the two of them jumped in the air. I followed behind feeling like I was missing out on an inside joke.

"It feels just like old times." Fang said with a smile on his face and wind whipping his jet black hair like it was doing to mine. He glanced at me on his right side with Angel taking up his left flank and smiled even wider. "Only now it's better than the good old days."

_Mom, here we come._ I thought as I smiled back at my father. Maybe dreams could come true for a mutant like me.

* * *

**AN: Just fixed my internet. Sorry for the long wait guys. Review :) This story is almost wrapping up so if there is something you'd like to see, let me know.**


	33. Mommy?

_Mom, here we come._ I thought as I smiled back at my father. Maybe dreams could come true for a mutant like me.

Chapter Thirty-Two: Mommy?

"You sure that Ella said Max came back every year?" Fang asked for the hundredth time since we had arrived back in New Mexico. We were hiding in the neighbor's house, glad that they decided this would be the perfect week to take their summer vacation, and watching the Martinez house closely.

Angel just nodded. "Every year on Gazzy's birthday, which, last time I checked, was today." She frowned at the mention of her brother, again. "Now, quit fidgeting or I'll expose us now and Ella will warn Max that we're here." Angel threatened and my father took the hint.

"I'm sorry." Fang apologized, though I could tell he hardly ever said that by the way Angel looked at him.

"For what?" She asked, though she could have easily gotten the answer from his mind.

"For not being there when Gazzy died, for letting the Flock get split up," he looked at me with a heartbreakingly sad expression, "and for not noticing what was going on with Max and being a coward about it instead of finding the truth sooner."

"You didn't know." I said, trying to ease his guilt. "Don't put yourself down, from what I've gathered from everyone, Max kept it hidden so well that none of them knew either."

"She's right." Angel said, with a look similar to Fang's on her face now. I don't know why they felt guilty when I didn't blame them in the slightest. "Max blocked her thoughts and had Ella block hers as well. All I knew was that Max was sad and missed you and Gazzy terribly."

The two of them settled into silence, each wrapped up in their own thoughts. I let them ponder since I knew it was what they needed.

"How...how did he die?" Fang asked at long last, breaking the silence.

"Expiration date." Angel said bitterly. "The only one that kicked in before Max could make a deal with Jeb."

"Wait, she saw Jeb?" Fang asked angrily, mostly at himself though. "That was the point in coming to live here with Dr. Martinez, to keep her _away_ from that evil man! Why didn't she ever listen to me? I warned her against going anywhere_ near_ the School again. And what does she do? The second I leave, she flies straight to his lair!"

"Calm down, Fang." Angel said in a hush-hush voice. "That's all in the past."

"All in the _past?_" Fang asked, slightly less irritated, but still partly fuming. "Who knows what They did to her there or what the effects of it were! How long was she gone after that?" Angel stayed quiet, her eyes focusing on anything but Fang.

"She didn't come back, did she?" He asked quietly, noticing the hurt in Angel's baby blues.

"I only saw her once after that." Angel admitted. "When Krystal was born. I don't know how Max knew, but she did, and when she showed up, we were all so excited that she had returned that we didn't bother to think about the fact that she might not stay. When she walked out again, I could tell in her thoughts that she wasn't staying; not then, and probably not ever."

As tears streamed down her face, Fang wrapped her into a hug. It looked uncomfortable for both of them...I remember a memory, not mine, that Brain showed me of Angel giving Fang a hug much like this one.

I reached over and joined in on the hug, comforted slightly knowing that I wasn't the only one who was looking forward to finding Max. They had at least gotten to know her; I, on the other hand, had yet to meet the woman who gave life to me.

I shed a tear for the life that could have been-growing up with Fang and Max as my actual parents and knowing that they loved me; surrounded by the Flock, learning things from each of them that I didn't, or couldn't, already know; having Krystal as a fun cousin to teach cool things like karate and kissing boys; Total barking (or more like yapping) as he chased us in the air.

I missed the potential life that I could never re-have more than I missed Taylor and my real life that I had given up in search of my parents.

"First time to see me in sixteen years and you're all falling apart. Pathetic." A voice said behind us and I whipped my head around to see my mother standing before us in all her glory.

Her blonde-brown hair was pulled back into a bun, though fly-aways framed her face coincidently, her intense gaze held ours and it was strange to see my brown eyes looking so fierce, and her hands were on her hips in a no nonsense gesture.

"Max!" Fang let out, not able to control himself any longer. When he let go of us and moved to wrap his arms around her instead, she flinched and moved a few feet closer to the door.

Angel was silent, probably prying into her former leader's mind, and I wondered why her expression was suddenly so sad.

"Good to see you survived, Alexis." Max said, acknowledging my existence briefly though making no attempts to come closer to any of us. She looked over our heads as she spoke her next words. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't bother Ella any more."

That was all she said, no "I missed you all" or "look how big you all have gotten." I hated to say it after all the searching I had done, but I was starting to regret looking for my mother.

Who was this cold, vacant woman in front of me and what happened to the wonderful leader from my visions?


	34. The Truth: Dirty and Ugly

Chapter Thirty-Three: The Truth: Dirty and Ugly

""I'd appreciate it if you didn't bother Ella any more."" Angel repeated Max's words, though with such vile bitterness that I thought she might actually shoot lasers from her eyes. "Are you_ freaking_ kidding me?" Only that wasn't the word she used.

Now I could see that the youngest Flock member was about to lose it. I tried to reach for her to pull her back, but she saw the plan in my head and moved a second before I could touch her shirt.

"Yes." Max said blankly. "My sister is really upset about you guys coming around here asking questions about me after I swore her to secrecy."

"Why did you do that?" Angel asked, truly on a roll now. I don't think anyone could stop her if they tried. Though Fang and I were obviously curious as well, so we didn't really reign her in.

"Why _did_ you have Ella lie to us all these years?" Angel asked, but gave Max no time to reply. She simply continued asking questions, possibly getting the answers from Max's mind, though I can't be sure since Max's face remained unchanged.

"Why didn't you tell us about Lexi? Did you think it made you less of a leader?" Angel seemed to have hit a sore spot. Being the strong fearless leader was everything to my mother, apparently. "Because we wouldn't of cared about her being around. But you had to screw that up, didn't you? You left her at some church and broke up the Flock, why? So she could be normal? Face it! Lexi searched for us because she was a freak!"

Angel paused to smile sadly at me. I let her continue though because that was pretty much how I felt. I wanted to know my mother's reply as much as Angel did.

"Lexi has wings! That just can't be forgotten about! She knew she was special and always dreamed about finding her family. Not to mention the stupid Voice you gave her, he told her all about the Flock because that is where she _belongs_." She put extra emphasis on that part.

"So, by pure luck, she was in a class with Krystal, which led her to Iggy and Nudge, which led her to me, which led her to go off on her own. I followed her to Ella's, though my vision was heading us in Fang's direction before that."

Angel was no longer fuming, but she still looked ticked as she finished telling our tale.

"We took out a School together, Fang's new flock and us. Lexi almost died, though you never thought about that when you left all of us, did you? You assumed that you were the reason the School tracked us because of your Voice, but they didn't care..."

"They only stopped looking for you guys because of my deal." Max cut in furiously. "You think that you would all be safe if it hadn't been for my sacrifices?"

"We would have been a family still!" Angel cried out. "I loved you Max, you were my sister and my mother and my best friend, then, suddenly, one day you were just gone...and when you returned, you were distant. I didn't know who you were anymore. I guess it was a good thing that you went to make a deal with Jeb because you were already split from the Flock by then."

"I never meant to..." Max said, her armor finally seeming to crack. "I only wanted to protect all of you. You have to believe me."

Angel's eyes softened. "Of course I believe you, Max. I just...I wish you hadn't of done it like that. We were unstoppable together, but apart, well, you and Fang weren't the only ones who were experimented on after Lexi was born."

"You were both captured?" Max asked, looking from Fang to Angel with a scrunched brow.

Angel shook her head. "Fang was. They caught him before you made your deal and swiped his memory. He didn't know who he was in order to come back and find us."

"What about you, Ange?" Fang asked regretfully. "You didn't tell me that you had been captured."

"That's because I wasn't." Angel said with a sigh. "I needed to find the two of you. Max had returned for Krystal's birth, but she took off back to the School to finish paying off her 'debt.' I saw in her mind that she was close to being finished, so I followed her in an attempt to convince them to shorten her 'sentence' if I let them experiment on me too. I figured, at the very least, the two of us could be together again."

"But I never saw you there..." Max said, sounding more confused than before. "Though, my time did shorten for no explained reason."

"That's because my plan worked, but it didn't go like I wanted it to." Angel said with a sigh. "They agreed to my deal, and began experimenting right away, but they wouldn't let me see Max for fear that it would mess up our testing and they figured we'd escape if we were put in the same room."

"Ange, I'm so sorry." Max said honestly. "I never meant for you to come after me. I did what I did to protect all of you from the School."

"But we're safe now. Why were you so cold earlier?" Fang asked in almost a whisper, his eyes fixed on his Max.

"Because..." She whispered back, taking a small step closer to him. "I was afraid that you guys hated me. I couldn't let my guard down in case that was true...because if I lost you guys again, but because of rejection...well, I don't think that I would be able to keep going."

"Max..." Fang whispered, gently brushing away a strand of her hair and taking the final step separating them. "I could never hate you." Her head was down, so he tilted her face up with his fingers. "I love you, Maximum Ride, and that hasn't changed in the last seventeen years."

"I've never stopped loving you either." Max replied. "I've always loved you, Fang, you should know that by now."

In the next second, their lips collided with such intense passion that I was worried for a second that I would have to watch a little sibling being created. But seeing my parents make-out was the most beautiful sight in the world. My family was complete now that they were back together.

"You're not mad at me?" Max asked, burying her head in his chest in a Kodak moment that made me realize just how much love had been used to create me.

"I'm just upset that we lost all of this time." Fang replied honestly. He glanced over his shoulder to see that Angel and I were still here. "That we all lost this time." He motioned for the two of us to join them.

Hugging my parents and my new sister-of-sorts, I had never felt more whole. No matter what happened next, I knew that I would always have them with me.

"Let's go see the others, shall we?" Max asked, winking at Angel.

"Nudge and Krystal are going to flip!" Angel burst out, a wide smile on her face as we all walked outside.

"U and A." Max said with such pride and happiness that I couldn't deny that she was suited to be the leader. I smiled at my mother when I took the left side of her up in the air, my father on her right, and Angel taking up the flank. _This_ was what I was meant to do. I was finally home.

* * *

**AN: Only one chapter left :( But I hope that you all have enjoyed coming along for the ride :) It has been a blast to write. Thanks for all of the wonderful reviews. I'm happy that so many of you added it to your favorites. I love you guys! :) **


	35. Happily Ever After

_Epilogue-two weeks later _

Music began playing in the room next to where I was standing, and I had to count to a hundred just to calm my nerves. Taylor saw my distress and ran a comforting hand over my arm to calm me. He looped his arm with mine and I blushed.

I had missed him desperately while I was searching for my parents, but I knew that he understood how important it was for me to do it. That's why I loved him. We didn't need secrets because neither of us had anything to hide.

Nudge, up ahead, muttered to Krystal to keep moving and my first real friend did as she was told. Her hot pink floor length dress dragged a little behind her as she threw flowers up in the air, but she didn't care. She was twelve and didn't fully understand how big of a deal this wedding was.

_I_, on the other hand, completely understood the importance. Fang proposed as soon as everyone was finished hugging Max, right there in front of Nudge, Iggy, Angel, Total, Krystal, and me. Max apologized for saying "yes" sixteen years too late, but Fang brushed it off, instead kissing her deeply enough to embarrass his niece.

Krystal was the flower girl, Total was the ring bearer, Ella was a bridesmaid escorted by Iggy (the best man), Angel and Ella were the other two bridesmaids and walked down together behind Ella, and I took up the rear with Taylor.

That just left me with a spot to fill. I was more than happy to be another bridesmaid, but Max wasn't having any of it. I got to be the maid of honor and, as cliche as it sounds, I was honored that my mother chose me.

We all wore whatever we wanted (or in my case, what Nudge wanted) and were all in matching dresses in different colors. Krystal's was hot pink, Nudge's was bright orange, Ella's was lime green, and mine was electric blue. Iggy and Taylor were in simple black tuxes with white button down shirts underneath.

I saw the Spearmens in the second row, opposite Ella's husband and children, and I gave a small wave.

Though most of them didn't know about the wings or me being special, they had all accepted me leaving gracefully. Though I had been in their foster home for almost a year and they were planning on adopting me, they knew that I belonged with my real parents.

The paperwork was the only thing that kept this wedding from happening two weeks ago.

Max wanted me to be legally hers again when she walked down the aisle. "It's the only way that I'll do this." Max told Fang sternly. "I want my family to be there."

Of course, Fang agreed completely.

When we got to the end of the aisle, Taylor went to sit down and we all turned to look at Max walking down in all white.

She wasn't in a typical wedding dress, but that had never been her style. Instead, she was fitted in white white-wash jeans, a white baby doll tee, and matching white ballet slippers. She looked gorgeous, and exactly like my mother,_ the_ Maximum Ride.

Fang was dressed in his typical get-up: black jeans and black boots. In place of his usual worn out black t-shirt, he had a white button down that really made his eyes pop. This was, after all, a wedding.

Their vows were simple and to the point, but no one cared much that it took longer for all of us to get into our dresses than it did for them to exchange eternal vows.

My parents were in love like they were teenagers still, and I had my boyfriend by my side; nothing could make this day better.

This wasn't just my fairytale finally coming true, it was my life. This was my happily ever after. I never dreamed it could happen to a mutant freak like me. But that just goes to show you that anything is possible.


End file.
